Part 2 (a close call with caffeine)

Coffee: or how I ended up incapacitated on the couch yesterday

Ok, so yesterday I established last that I am not a beer snob, but I somehow managed to actually miss ‘good’ beer (I’m being liberal with my use of the word “good”. So sue me). Now it’s time to cover how I’m not a coffee snob either, except that I kind of am. Turns out I miss a certain quality of coffee too. Here’s a hint, it’s not in a big orange and pink bag labeled DUNKIN’ DONUTS!

While living in Durango, it wasn’t uncommon for me to frequent the local coffee shops. Ok, I went every day. The baristas at Durango Coffee Company knew me by name, and I always got the dark roast and drank it black. Yeah, I’m a purist. Well, I was a purist. Then I came home. (I was also not a purist when I drank the rocket fuel grade “coffee” produced by a few of my friends. These are also the friends who would turn a nose up at Blue Moon. I think they have some taste bud issues.)

So normally I drink one cup of coffee in the morning (maybe two if I’m feeling especially outrageous). My mom makes a really big pot of coffee though, weak DUNKIN’ DONUTS coffee (maybe two if there’s company). That being the case, it’s not unusual to see 3 or 4 cups go down. The key is that on top of the half-full cup of weak coffee, you have to pour milk, filling the rest of the cup. So now you have mildly coffee-flavored milk. You can see how a whole pot might go down pretty nicely, like cheap beer. You can also probably see how I easily help my mom through a couple of pots. After the rich, full, dark roasts I’m used to, the DD just really doesn’t do it for me. It’s like leaving Guinness for PBR. I have to pour on the milk for the coffee-flavored dairy effect (purism is overrated). It’s really not so bad, and it keeps the headaches at bay (I’m addicted. Whatever.  I’m moving to Costa Rica).

Yesterday though, mom and dad were gone to work. I woke up to an empty house, and an empty coffee pot. I wandered over to the pantry, one eye still working on that whole opening thing, the other navigating. I stared at the bag of DD coffee, and thought very seriously about how cool that whole breakfast tea thing is. They make breakfast blends you know, like Morning Thunder. In retrospect, I should have gone with the Morning Thunder. I opted instead for the sample packet of Starbucks Christmas espresso roast. It was sneakily hiding behind the bag of DD. The shiny purple package caught my eye, and I knew. Yes. Never mind that it was ‘best by January of 2012’. That’s not so long ago. I happily snatched the lonely French press off the back of the counter as I turned on the burners and started the tea pot to boiling. I opened the beautiful little purple package as if it contained flecks of gold and started measuring out the treasure into the press. After about 3 Tbsp I just dumped the whole thing in (about 6 Tbsp…espresso roast).

So, let’s recap. For the past month I have been drinking coffee-flavored milk. Before that I was drinking one little cup of dark roast coffee (that has the lower caffeine content). Today I dumped 6 heaping tablespoons of espresso roast coffee into a French press (which makes pretty strong coffee). I then drank all of it. Two full coffee cups (big coffee cups). It tasted like dark, spicy, coffee heaven. And then…that’s right, there’s an “and then”. This is getting a little long winded so I won’t go into every detail, but not only was my heart pounding like a hit parade and my hands shaking like a leaf in the wind, my stomach was doing something entirely new, and unpleasant at that. No words. But where coffee normally leaves one charged and ready to face the day, this left me curled up on the couch in something  that can only be described as shock. My mind wanted to run laps around the house, and my body was just shaken, a little nauseated, and mostly confused.

Moral of the story: When in doubt…no, when you are entirely sold heart and soul, go with the Morning Thunder anyway. Really. Oh and I guess ‘too much of a good thing’ really does exist.

Part 1 (I think I might be kind of a beer snob)

First, missing my friends and the wonderful people goes without saying. Second, I could have written a whole page listing things I used to do or see every day that I can’t or don’t anymore, but who wants to read that? Plus, I would get sad writing it and that’s not the point here. I’d rather think about how funny it is when you realize you miss certain things.

1: Good beer:

“Hot” doesn’t do justice to the temperature (nor to the general sense you are being slowly smothered by the air) in East Texas in the summer. Even the lake water turns from a refreshing splash to a disheartening splish by the end of a day in the sun. My cousins, aunt and uncle, and I sat on our life jackets in what was quickly becoming uncomfortably warm water. We laughed and shared stories from long ago, or days ago, and we downed our cold beers like water. The near-boiling lake water just wasn’t getting the job done so really beer was our only hope for survival.

Now, I have never been much of beer snob (or so I thought). I’d go to 2$ pint night and while many of my friends would “ooh” and “ahh” and drool a little over a good stout or an IPA that could make your eye-lids curl back, I would sip happily on my Blue Moon or whatever  local wheat beer was available. Every now and then I would step over into Guinness land or tiptoe around in Red Ale world. The really bitter beers weren’t so much my thing, but I could stomach one in a pinch. My only experience with “cheap beer” began and ended with Pabst Blue Ribbon. That was the party beer. You just chugged it and after about 3 you were at least tipsy enough not to care what it tasted like the rest of the night. That was two years ago though. I hadn’t voluntarily sipped anything that was better suited for beer bonging since before graduation.

Ok, so back to the lake: I mentioned we were downing beers like water. The only beer you can down like water (If you can down a Guinness like water, you should get that checked out) is what I previously referred to as cheap beer (Bud Lite, Budweiser, Keystone, PBR, Coors…anything else you might find in a gas station in Texas). That’s right, my family could probably be credited with funding a whole summer’s worth of Bud Lite production. I think they polished off at least a couple of 30-racks over the weekend. I drank 8 beers in two and a half days. It took another two days to drink another four. I just couldn’t bring myself to down the stuff.

Even after my sober weekend I didn’t really realize that I missed good beer. I just confirmed that I didn’t like cheap beer. I still had a blast with my family, and when I got home I just went back to drinking water all the time as usual. It wasn’t until a few weeks later when my parents took me to Ranger Ball Park for a baseball game that it happened. I hadn’t had another beer since the lake and hadn’t thought anything of it, but as we sat in the Captain Morgan Club looking over the menu “Blue Moon” just about jumped off the page and kissed me on the face. That was it. No pondering necessary. “I’ll have water and a Blue Moon please.” When the bottle appeared in front of me I might have gotten a little too excited (like Christmas morning to a 7-year-old excited as opposed to the appropriate confined satisfaction a 24-year-old should have when encountering a beer). I squeezed the orange slice down into the bottle and took a big refreshing swig. It tasted like home. It tasted like sitting out on a patio surrounded by my friends, laughing and making all kinds of crazy plans. It tasted like watching the sun set from the front steps or like floating the river in the sun.

I know Blue Moon isn’t great beer. I know plenty of people who would turn their noses up at the mere thought of it. You take what you can get though, and that Wednesday night, sitting in that Bar in East Texas, I took that Blue Moon and I enjoyed every last sip of it like I had enjoyed every last minute I spent in Durango.

[To be continued: I’ll cover coffee and fashion faux pas later. We’ll call it a series.]

If I were a smart phone...

Dear User,

I appreciate the attention. Really I do. But give it a rest already. Geez! I mean from the minute you wake up in the morning to the series of moments you spend fighting it until you actually just pass out, you never put me down. In fact, because you passed out with me in your hand, I’m even smothered by you as you sleep. I mean seriously, how would you like to be stared at and poked and prodded? All. Day. Long? If it’s not a text message it’s Facebook. If it’s not a picture it’s YouTube. It’s word feud and angry birds. It’s maps and navigators and sports updates. Do you even know what the actual weather is doing? No, not the weather on my screen, the actual weather. Look up every once in a while. Did you know your friend just asked you a question? Actually, what is she wearing today? Again, NO! Not what is she wearing in her profile picture on facebook. What is she wearing right now, today. She is standing right in front of you. No! Don’t take a picture of her. Just look up. Say hi! Interact. Give me a break! I realize that I’m fascinating, mesmerizing even, but there is still a physical world. Oh, and those commercials about not texting and driving apply to you too. In fact, I would go so far as to advise them to tell users not to even look at the phone and drive. Put me down. I’ll be right there, ready to go when you get where you are going. And speaking of where you are going, the next time you are in Paris or London or New York, or at the Grand Canyon I WILL power off if you dare spend more time looking at me than looking around, soaking up the experience. That AT&T commercial about getting service everywhere—Not my idea. Get a life!

Now, none of this is to say we can’t be friends. I just need some space. I know I’ve been a little harsh, I just get cranky when I’m being smothered. I’m sorry. I just want what’s best for you, so please try to find a little balance. Sure, check me out when you have a question or need to look something up, but don’t be afraid to interact with other people. I hope this can really make for a richer friendship for both of us.

Sincerely,

Your overused smart phone

Dear wind, can we make a pit stop back home?

He didn’t know what he was doing at the time, or that’s how it sounds to hear him tell it. Actually, I believe it. If my dad gave any credit to the profound power of names and words he probably would have named me Cypress or Pine instead. He would really rather me sprout some roots and nurture a sturdy trunk of responsibility and financial security. He is the father of an only daughter after all. What can you expect?

Rooted and sturdy are not what he got though. He named me LittleCloud instead. Certainly it has an endearing ring to it, and it is appropriately reminiscent of my native roots. These are probably the actual reasons he chose this particular name. (Off the record, I’m not ruling out the possibility of the ‘littlecloud’ as a subconscious manifestation of my dad’s inner closet-hippie…that’s for another day though). Intentions aside, it has been 24 years since I was brought into the world and given a name to grow into, and that name is having its way with me. (I have my suspicions that it has always been my puppet master, but for the sake of brevity I’ll leave the child psychology for another time and place)

Let’s consider the qualities of a cloud for a minute. They are ever-changing, ever-moving, followers of the wind. They are waterlogged, silver-lined, and, according to Wordsworth, lonely. How does that sound dad? No, your daughter will not be building a house a few miles down the road from you and raising little pine-tree babies. Instead, she is going off to explore the world and probably fall in love with it. The whole thing. The world and the wind will shape and change her and she will just happily keep moving and seeing until she inevitably evaporates…or cries to death (too far with the cloud thing?). But you can rest assured that she will be optimistic about the whole experience! Loneliness is the only quality left, and for the sake of maintaining that lovely silver lining, it should probably just be left alone.

So there. That’s it. My dad unwittingly created a world traveler and I love him for it. (My mom does too because she wants to come visit me wherever I go ;)  I am about to embark upon my first really big adventure (hopefully the first of many, many more). I’m moving to South America to learn Spanish and teach English. So far the wind hasn’t steered me wrong.  So thank you dad, for not naming me Pine or Cypress. I’ll have a talk with the wind. I’m sure we can see about getting me back here every once in a while.

My first baseball game...or how I learned to be a kid again

I am 24-years-old, strong-willed, independent, imaginative and responsible, and I’m going to my first baseball game! Yay! You would think it was Christmas morning the way I woke up way too early, fidgety and ready to go. What am I going to wear? With my newfound, childlike excitement I scurried downstairs to ask my parents when we are leaving, only to find that they weren’t even stirring yet. I realized then that it was in fact only 7:30 in the morning, and the game doesn’t even start until 6 this evening. A little disappointed, I tiptoed back upstairs resigned myself to sitting here at the computer screen, thinking about what it means to be a kid again.

Since I moved home, I have had to deal with the fact that I am once again under my parents’ roof and that I am, in their eyes anyway, their little girl still. At first this was frustrating. I had been taking perfectly good care of myself for 4 years since moving to Colorado. I had been buying my own food, cleaning my own kitchen, dressing myself and getting myself safely from point a to point b without anyone giving me any advice on how to go about it, or asking what I’m doing every 5 minutes. Suddenly having to coordinate my life with two adults who, to some degree, do still maintain the status of ‘the boss of me’ was a bit shocking to my sense of independence.

Slowly but surely though, I began to embrace my long lost role of daughter.  I joined my parents for coffee on the porch in the morning and listened to the advice and ideas they had to offer for my future plans. I accepted the fact that my mother will always take advantage of my lower status, and I will inevitably end up getting the mail, cleaning the kitchen, making the beds and bringing her whatever random thing she left in the other room so she doesn’t have to get up off the couch. [If I ever have children they will be my personal slaves] My dad will never run out of “stump talks,” and if he does he will never tire of repeating the old ones again and again to ensure that I am left with every ounce of fatherly wisdom he can possibly impart. Everything is dangerous, hairy-legged boys are all good-for-nothing bums, and situational awareness and personal responsibility can be applied to every facet of your life.

It’s really not that bad though. My pride does wince a little at the fact that they are now paying for pretty much everything. I know, terrible right? But seriously, I have to eventually face the fact that I did fail to fly on my own. I tried to make a life on a service industry salary in a tourist town with a high cost of living. I did fine too. But fine isn’t what I want or what I need. I have a heart for travel and for adventure and new experiences. Living from paycheck to paycheck doesn’t leave much room for changing the world.

Fortunately, I have parents who love me, and who will gladly take me in and help me get back on my feet. Not everyone is so lucky. I get to come home to the house I grew up in. I get to experience feelings and memories I had forgotten existed. A lot of kids are kicked out of the nest and have to figure it out the best they can, and that’s not necessarily bad. The realization though, makes me cherish my time here a little more.

In less than a month I’ll be flying off to try again. With the help of my parents I have made a plan and hopefully this time I’ll be a little more successful. Until then though, I’m going to go to a baseball game. I’m going to ride in the backseat, and ask if we are there yet (I’ll definitely have to pee before we get there), and I’m going to cheer as loud as I can. I’m 24-years-old, and maybe I should be a grown-up, but I’m going to embrace this chance to be a kid again and learn everything I can from it. 

the end...followed by a new beginning

The end began in tears, as most endings do. I didn't know at the time that the tears were the beginning of the end, but then we rarely do. (That rhyme was a complete accident. I'm sorry if it offends you. I'm not changing it.) All I wanted then was my own bed (which I hadn't had since January when I gave mine away because it was hurting my back). Actually, the bed was irrelevant. What I really wanted was my own space. I hadn't had one of those since June 3, the day my roommate and I locked our apartment for the last time and left our keys to the land lord. For the past 2 months I had been couch surfing, backpacking, attending a funeral, and couch surfing some more. Now don't get me wrong, backpacking and couch surfing  are great ways to save money and acquire some good stories (funerals, less so), but when you are trying to figure out what you are actually doing with your life, not having a place to sit down and think, or even sleep, is not super helpful.

*****

I went to work Tuesday morning. No. I woke up too early, went for a run, took a shower, went into town for coffee, then went to work at 10 Tuesday morning. Work was Poppy's, a cute little sandwich shop in Durango, Colorado. I had only been there about 3 weeks, long enough to learn everything, rock at it, be off 3 days in a row, and come back to work more useless than I was when I started. We'll just say I was still getting into the swing of things. Everyone was nice...except for the one girl who really, really wasn't nice at all. It only takes the one. One person being unnecessarily rude can just completely drain you. Well, that and having a line out the door for the better part of 3 hours. That can be a little tiring too. By the time I got off work at 3:30 Tuesday afternoon (I know, not a long shift. Don't judge me) I was pooped. All I wanted was to go home (which I didn't technically have) and take a nap.

Well I went to the next best thing to home, my friend Sarah's house where all of my stuff was living. I was probably about to go out and do something awesome instead of taking a nap...no, it was raining. I was totally going to be lame, but a friend called and he and his roommate wanted to take me to dinner as a thanks for dog-sitting the most wonderful dog in the whole wide world (sorry to all you other dogs, I'm sure you're great). I went. I ate. It was great. It was 6pm and I was was full and sleepy. Now I really, really just wanted to go home (which i still didn't have) and take a nap.

I returned to Sarah's house, where not only was all of my stuff living, but all of our friend John's stuff was there too. Actually, let me just take a moment to explain this house to you. It is tiny. Two people could comfortably live there. Three people were on the lease, two people were couch surfing, and all of us were immensely popular so all of our friends were in and out at any given time. In short, the living room couch was not the ideal place for me to sit and be alone.

"John, if I start crying I promise it isn't anything you said."
"Oh god. Ok. Are you ok?"
"Yes. I'm just very, very tired, and when I get tired I kind of cry unexpectedly."
"Ok."
"Ok."

I cried. I then started laughing because I felt stupid about crying. Then Bryce (who actually lived in the house), John and I sat down for a movie. Well they sat. I curled up in a ball with every intention of passing out as fast as possible. Great success!

When I woke up the next morning, still on the couch, I knew. I had avoided the thought the night before. It would only have made me cry more. But in the light of morning I knew what I had to do. I didn't have a particularly overflowing income, granted I didn't have to pay rent or bills, but if was planning on staying in Durango through winter I would eventually need a roof over my head. My friends are nice, but even lovable little me might get annoying on the couch after about 3 months. Aside from my friends, and of course Durango itself, there was nothing truly keeping me there. I had graduated a year ago, I had a disposable job, I didn't have a lease and most of my stuff was in boxes anyway.

"Mom. I'm coming home."
"What!?"
"I'm coming home. Not right this minute, but I'll be leaving in a few days."

That was Wednesday. I left Friday morning after having quit my job, closed my bank account, packed my life into my little car, and said my teary-eyed goodbyes.

*****

I'm at my parents' house now, in East Texas where I certainly don't belong. I have grown to appreciate it as my source and love it for all its quirks, but my heart still lies in the mountains somewhere. Maybe I'll go back one day. Until then though, I have finally found a direction for my previously floating life. The end of my time in Durango began in tears, but now I am facing a whole new beginning and a fresh, clear-eyed start (until my allergies kick up, then all bets are off). I have a one-way ticket to Guatemala where I am going to build a water well, then work on Spanish for 2 months. After that I'm flying down to Costa Rica to get certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language (TEFL). Hopefully said certification will lead to a job there. As hard as it is to leave the things you love, sometimes you have to in order to grow and to stay alive and to remember why you love to begin with.