Three Cups of Coffee

Unlike the social weight of drinking tea that Greg Mortenson described in his book, Three Cups of Tea, having three cups of coffee will likely just send you to the restroom, again. I've been cutting down on the amount and type of caffeine I take in -- basically forgoing some coffee during the week in exchange for green or black tea. Today I really missed it. Earl Grey just isn't French Roast. By 8:04 nobody was dressed, only I had eaten anything, I wasn't sure of the potty status, the van was covered in a mild overnight snowfall, and the swim bag was not packed. I used the same words -- good cooperation, dressed first or brush teeth?, boots and jackets! -- but I felt like I was in a cloud in the next room instead of right with Elliott and Dietrich. We made it there at the start of the lesson, but my head remained in a fog. I couldn't even come up with chatter to share with the other parents watching their swimmers. By the time we got home and shoveled the sidewalks (while one child cried over his fate at having to be outside and "helping") it was too late for more caffeine. Any after noon finds me greeting the 3am moon. And so the fog went on.

But it isn't just for the fog clearing that I adore my morning java. From the warming of the milk to the first smooth sip, there are pieces of other days -- other lives -- gathered up. The smell of roasted beans reminds me of studying in coffee shops. When Ryan and I first met I was preparing to take the LSAT, the law school entrance exam. For a good part of a Saturday, we would hole up in Dunn Brothers' and sit at the table nearest the coffee roaster. It made an exhausting sound, a mix between a vacuum cleaner and an espresso machine, but the noise covered the voices and chatter of people in the shop. I suffered through questions about people in canoes who were wearing red and blue shirts and who could ride together if only red shirts could be with people who had names beginning with T and why was I taking this test again? Ryan read medical journals, papers, and took practice board tests. Just the weekend before the boys were born we sought refuge in the air conditioned comfort of a coffee shop. Ryan again studying for boards, and I getting together an email list for our upcoming big news.

Tasting roasted beans lights a fire for me. From morning campfires of comfort in the Boundary Waters to the necessary fires for cooking and warmth in Musikee (the same spot where the moon showed me the rabbit for the first time), a fire in the morning welcomes the day and does the work of the sun while it is still creeping over us.

Then there is the milk. Rarely had I spotted milk in some one's coffee before I lived in Slovakia. My family was a take-it-as-it-is kind of coffee drinking family. But in Slovakia I learned not only that American coffee cups are huge, but that milk, especially steamed milk, is quite delicious in a new-to-me kind of coffee -- espresso. My European classmates took me to cafes to show me the coffee menus. Who would have thought coffee could be had so many ways (this was before the seeping of Starbucks across the planet)? We used tiny teaspoons of raw sugar and took up table space for an hour over a cup that held three tablespoons of coffee. I brought back tiny cups and saucers and vowed I would sip a cappuccino, not gulp a mug of coffee. But there was little audience for slow sipping, and the cups grew smaller the longer I was back.

Now I drink nearly equal portions of milk and coffee, saving my stomach and keeping just a little of the European coffee experience alive. Or I drink tea, with milk, or green, just plain.