Over a cup of Coffee

For 3 months now, I haven’t had coffee. The last one was at the New York airport on my way to Delhi. So what changed after that?

Nothing really, but for the fact that I have been meaning to give up on coffee for a while now. It wasn’t so much about the caffeine part as it was about the sugar, the cream, and of course the smell of coffee. I don’t know if I make sense, but I think the Seattle air smells of coffee. With that, every few steps, you find a coffee shop. You see people walking around with coffee. I think when you see and smell something all around you, it is the easy thing to “do it”. It becomes a behavioral pattern.

So is it like, when you don’t see something, you don’t crave for it? The Kolkata air smells of anything but coffee. Yes I do remember I once had a cold coffee a few days ago at Barista. But it was more for the sake of making conversation at a coffee shop. I don’t think I craved for it or enjoyed it that much. Staying at home, I haven’t even craved for coffee. Mother is surprised I keep saying no to coffee/cold coffee every time she asks me. True, my lifestyle has been different, less stressful, with no need to stay up late or work hard (things we associate with coffee addiction). I’ve had other food cravings too that distracted me from coffee, mainly the sweets and mangoes that satisfied my sugar cravings. Of course good home cooked food kept me happy and distracted me from coffee.

So how is it going to be once I am back in Seattle? Am I going to crave for coffee, just because there is real work to do now, no home cooked food or a restful lifestyle for me, and because I am going to be in a city that smells of coffee? Frankly I don’t know, and I’d try my best to continue staying away from coffee. But as of now, after abstinence for 3 months, I neither crave for it, nor enjoy the smell of it.

sunshine