Coffee, Good to The Last Dropkick
I was not a coffee person, not as a teenager, not as a young adult, or as an adult. That was until I started to work in corporate America and then, boy oh boy, did I drink coffee.
One of the things you need to do when you join a new group at work, surrounded by strangers, you want to fit in. So it was no different when I started my ‘career’ at AT&T in the mid-eighties, I just wanted to fit in.
I found myself in the center of three rows of desks, four across, with huge windows in front of us, and a line of cabinets behind.
I didn’t know it at the time, but those strangers I worked with then, some of them are still my friends over forty years later.
And do you know how we got there?
Coffee.
(No, not really, but since this is a post about coffee thought I’d throw that out there)
Like I stated before, when you start a new job, you just want to fit in. That is the reason when a woman from the group asked me if I wanted to join the coffee club, I said yes, even though I didn’t drink coffee.
“It’s only five dollars a week,” she said, then added “and you can drink as much coffee as you want.”
I handed over the money, and just like that I was in the club.
Turned out, over the next few weeks, I learned to love coffee. I’d pour my first cup the moment I walked into the office. Next cup before lunch, another after lunch, and one before I left for the day.
Maybe it was the job, but a new sense of anxiety filled my body. My right heel bounced against the floor for most of the day. When not on the keyboard, I’d tap my fingers on my desktop. It was hard to sit still and walked away from my desk several times during the course of the day.
I hoped the anxiety would cease as I grew more comfortable with my job, but that didn’t happen.
What did happen, though, I became part of the group, and now felt very comfortable with my co-workers.
Which turned out to be a good thing for me.
After I poured my third coffee of the day, I returned to my desk and casually mentioned to my co-worked to my left how I’ve been feeling antsy lately.
“It’s probably all the coffee that you drink,” he said without a second thought.
I had no idea why he said that and asked, “What do you mean?”
He gave me a quick look, with a curious gaze.
“Are you drinking decaf?”
I replied, “I’m drinking whatever is in the pot, why?”
He shook his head, a smile on his face.
“Coffee has caffeine, caffeine makes you jittery has hell,” he laughed, “did you not know that?”
Did I mentioned I never drank coffee before?
After this conversation I drank decaf from then on and cut back to one or two cups a day.
The anxiety, the antsy feeling, the jittery leg soon faded.
You could ask yourself, was it all worth it, the uncomfortable physical side effects of all that caffeine?
Of course it was…
...I was in the club!
