I poured a cup of coffee this morning.
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We have a monthly coffee delivery from our favorite roaster on the west coast. Each month, 2 bags of coffee - one regular, one decaf - arrive on my doorstep or in my mailbox. I carefully mix the bags together to create a half-caf blend for my husband, and I distribute the grounds between our primary home downstate and our little cabin/house up north. Coffee is such a simple thing, but when those beans are roasted to the perfect flavor profile, brewed at just the right temperature with water from our own well and then poured into my favorite mug (from PJ’s in the French Quarter; I’ve had it for over a decade), well, it’s a luxury. It’s also a cherished routine.
Each morning I take care of chores well before dawn. When all is quiet again, I turn all the lights off and sit down with my morning cup of coffee at the kitchen table. Our table faces a set of glass entry doors, and those doors give me a full view of the field outside and trees beyond. That field is full of life just before dawn – a herd of grazing deer, rafters of turkey, and the occasional opossum or nearly-white skunk walks by. I can open the door on warmer mornings, and it’s not unusual to hear the resident pack of coyotes winding down their hunt in the woods beyond the field. I cherish these moments. They ease me into my day and connect me deeply with the world. They are a reminder that this is normal, and all is happening just as it should. I am grateful to be a part of it. But back to coffee stuff.
Lately we’ve been drinking more coffee than usual, so our supply and demand ratio is a bit out of balance. I arrived at our up north house on a late Friday afternoon, unpacked, settled the dogs into their routine, then went to dinner with hubs and my dad. After dinner I began my usual prep routine for the next morning, and that’s when I found out we were out of coffee. Bad news. Our up north house is in a pretty rural setting, and the only store where I could buy coffee had already closed. More bad news. No coffee tomorrow morning.
The next day (after a disappointing earl grey substitute) I bought a bag of coffee from the local grocer during my usual round of errands in town. It wasn’t the same brand, and the flavor profile was different, but it would work. I returned home, emptied the coffee grounds into the usual container, and prepped the coffee to brew for the following morning.
(Spoiler alert - If you’re waiting for a big climactic ending to this story, there isn’t one. It ends with a perfectly boring little sizzle. And that’s the point.)
The dogs woke me up before dawn. I let them out to do their business and tried to do it quietly. Hubs was still sleeping. I turned on the coffeemaker and heard the familiar sound of the brew process beginning (a satisfying sound after my earl grey disappointment the morning before). After the dogs had been fed, they laid down to chew on their favorite toys in their dogs beds. Everything was quiet again.
The world outside was still dark. I turned the inside lights off and opened the blinds to the windows facing the field and trees. I sit at the table with my coffee and watch the natural world come to life. It never happens with a bang. It’s quiet. It’s simple – almost predictable.
This all brings me to my ‘simple’ cup of coffee. As I was pouring that first cup, I thought of all the steps I had to do the day before just to get that coffee into that cup. I thought about how the beans were grown and harvested, the hands (or machine) that packaged and transported them, the distance they traveled to land on that grocer’s shelf. I thought about my trip to the store, deciding on a substitute brand, having the means to purchase a bag of coffee, and the prep work the evening before so the morning brew could happen.
I thought about all of this as an uncomplicated knowing. There was no long contemplation, no tracing back to the source, no pause to offer gratitude for each of those steps. It was just this perfectly ‘un-pausable’ moment of pouring coffee into my favorite mug that put a hint of a smile on my face. Everything had happened exactly as it should have so that substitute coffee could flow into my favorite PJ’s mug, and I was thankful for the processes that made this otherwise unremarkable moment happen. It’s all so simple.
Coffee poured. I sat down at the table with the lights off and the shades open, and I watched dawn come and the world once again wake up.
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Contemplation Practice:
Think of one simple daily ritual you may take for granted. Would contemplation on its history, its back-story, the hands and hearts that influence it, help elevate your awareness of its significance? Would that inspire gratitude? Thankfulness? Could you keep it simple?