I am standing outside the pre-school I work at, after six weeks of no coffee.

There are vending machines to my right, to my left and a Family Mart (Asia’s version of the 7-11) staring at me from behind.

I yawn and my body feels tired and heavy after my morning bike-commute. I really like my job, mostly because the crazier I am the better I am at it. The level of crazy and straight-up ridiculousness it takes to just maintain, however, requires a lot of energy and, some days, like any other job, are just harder than others.

As I stand on the sidewalk trying to decide if I should just cave and buy the coffee before I fall asleep standing up, I imagine the three-year-old-jumping-high-fiving-pooping-screaming-laughing-machines that I’m up against this morning…I begin to dig around in my bag for loose change.

The issue in buying coffee is never finding enough change, but in making an actual choice, or rather, finding the coffee I choose to drink.

I like my coffee black and strong. Not asking for too much right? Should be an easy thing to come by. I shouldn’t have to worry about asking, “Does that coffee come in vegan?”

I spent five full minutes staring into the wondrous cavern of caffeine offered by the vending machine before finally spotting the one slot that offers plain, black, coffee. The options are overwhelming and the lack of regular, black, no-frills coffee is alarmingly apparent.

I shake my head and laugh to myself as I remember the Denis Leary skit that captures this moment and my coffee-frustration so well.

“Let me ask you this, is it impossible to get a cup of coffee-flavored-coffee anymore? Huh? What happened with coffee? Did I miss a f*cking meeting with the coffee? You can get every other flavor, but coffee-flavored-coffee. They got mochaccino, chococcino, frappuccino, cappuccino, rapaccino, Al Pacino, what the f*ck?” 

He gets all worked up about it, sweating, jumping around, yelling, almost vibrating on stage because he’s so upset about the abundance of coffee choices. In fact he claims he was so enraged about the automatic addition of syrups, creams and flavors to coffee that he actually gave it up…for awhile.

(I would just like to state that as much as I am on board with Denis Leary and his point about coffee-flavored-coffee, he strikes me as a guy that could use a little quiet time and some chamomile tea in his life and a little less coffee…)

So, dear Coffee-makers, in this crazy world of overwhelm and endless choices, please leave my f***ing coffee alone! Or at least leave the choices until after I’m caffeinated.

Love elephant and want to go steady?

Sign up for our (curated) daily and weekly newsletters!

   Editor: Travis May

   Photo Credit: Youtube