Coffee and Me, A Love Story 9.12.09

I became a coffee drinker at the age of 46. From my younger days until the time I discovered the dark steamy goodness of the roasted bean, I had never had even one cup. Over all those years I was offered coffee hundreds of time and somehow I had the ability to just say no – thanks. I told people I just never got into the habit. As a kid at Christmas time, I used to dunk my Mom’s cutout cream cookies into her cup of coffee and loved eating them. I’ll tell you about dunking toast into cocoa sometime, but that’s another story.
During my college years I worked in the Pottstown Mercury mailroom while the newspapers were being printed overnight. One of my last jobs to do as we wrapped up our work and just before the first shift folks came in to start theirs, was for me to start the big percolator coffeemaker. It was the silver metal kind, at least two feet tall with black handles, the black spout with a lever in front and the percolator basket inside. I filled it with water and one entire large can of Maxwell House coffee. Every time I opened a can I took a good long smell of the coffee grinds. I always loved the aroma but never had the desire to drink any.
All that began to change for me a few years back when a friend would meet me Saturday mornings to do some work at my house. He liked black coffee and I didn’t even own a coffee maker at the time so I would drive to our local Redner’s gas-mart near Fleetwood, PA and buy him a 20 ounce cup of coffee. One Saturday I took a look at the machine that dispenses hot chocolate, espresso and what they called cappuccino. A woman was standing in front of it filling her cup with a French vanilla cappuccino. I asked her “Is that very good?” She turned to me with dreamy eyes and in a sultry voice said “I love it” like she was describing her secret passion. I thought “Wow, I’ll have what she’s having” while hoping for the same experience that made her eyes roll back in her head. She was right, and I fell in love with it too.
My affair with cappuccino lasted several months until the day cappuccino broke my heart. When I realized there were as many calories in one of them as a milkshake, we had to break up. Sometime after, I was Christmas shopping with my wife and daughters at my least favorite place… the mall, when I found myself browsing at one of the fancy coffee shops. A new cappuccino flirted with me from the menu. I looked at the espressos, lattés, and various flavors of coffee. I considered getting involved with a new cappuccino but the $7.00 price scared me off. However I did have a fling with a $4.50 coffee, dark roast café muy macho - black. It was love at first sip. I have always loved the taste of dark and burnt anything, burnt pretzels – Splitz Extra Dark, dark chocolate, burnt hot dogs and the rest. My designer coffee came in a fancy cup so everyone could see where I bought my new Columbian friend. I had become a master of the plastic “sippy” lid so walking around the mall and drinking at the same time was not a problem for me. I couldn’t wait for my family to see me with my designer coffee cup. They were less impressed than I was but all of a sudden I felt like a grown up. “Hey look at me – adult man here drinking manly black coffee – stand back. Oh let me hold the door for you Madame, oh yes I am drinking black coffee, thanks for noticing.”
Now coffee has a part in most of my days. I’m not addicted but I am emotionally bonded to it. My favorite coffee is from the exceptionally exotic local café emporium - Redner’s Gas Mart. I prefer their Hazelnut with a splash of Shock, and my out of Berks County, PA favorite is McDonald’s coffee.
I have discovered the competitive part of coffee preparation. When I stop for coffee at a place where I pour my own cup, I think of it like a pit-stop in NASCAR. People who drink black coffee are fast. We pour our brew, snap on the lid and go. I am away and back on the race track while the other guys have dropped their lug nuts and are fooling around with dainty little cups of cream, tiny packs of sugar or worse, Sweet-N-Low and playing swizzle with the little bitty cocktail straws. Buy the time the coffee mixologists are still not finished working their recipes in their cups, changing what used to be coffee into who knows what, I already have my coffee and gas and I am long gone and out in first place. Cowboys out on the prairies herding cattle and fighting tumble weeds didn’t have cute little cream cups and pink packets of fake sugar. They drank their coffee black brewed over a fire, chewed the beans and brushed their teeth with the leftover coffee. Manly fast black coffee.