I scoffed at my roommate when she’d criticize Dunkin Donuts. Someone from New Jersey could never understand the heart of a New England morning. The glorious and welcoming pink and orange, the casual ambiguity in ordering “regular,” the less-than-a-dollar deliciously processed goods.
This was all until one morning while I was babysitting. I didn’t have time to grab my own coffee, so I tried a Starbucks Blonde Roast K-Cup from the family's cabinet. All I could think of, as I cradled the coziest cup of coffee, is the line from The Devil Wears Prada, “You sold your soul the day you put on those Jimmy Choo’s.”
I started sheepishly driving to the closest Starbucks to my house on the regular. I’d park- because there’s no drive through (America doesn’t run here, she enjoys her coffee)- and gleefully walk in. I remember the first time shyly asking, “Is a grande the same as your medium?”
It no longer mattered that my mum took the last of the hot coffee at home. Contrary to anything in the greedy month of August, my mornings now had something to look forward to.
Whether it was after a long and unrewarding run, on the way home from a frustrating doctor’s appointment, or before a stressful conversation- blonde roast coffee became a consistent and delightful companion in any situation.
All of those trips for the green straw, in the place with the dog walker’s advertisements and the vanilla shakers, were so enjoyable (too enjoyable?) that I began to question how much I deserved it.
Cue, please, a reality check for myself. Two actually. The first is that nothing can be too enjoyable. The second is that we don’t need to earn simple pleasures.
I wonder how many times we stop ourselves from doing something enjoyable because we think we need to achieve some self-construed goal first. When did this point system in our brains start? With food, exercise, reading- or whatever it is that we feel responsible for completing before we let ourselves have fun? They say the body craves the ingredients that it is lacking. The same must go for the mind. If we’re craving comfort or excitement or rest, then we need to pursue those instead of checking off the assignment book.
Mary Manin Morrissey urges her readers to “stop saving the good China.” Erma Bombeck writes in her poem If I Had My Life to Live Over, “I would have burned the pink candle sculpted like a rose before it melted in storage….I would have eaten the popcorn in the ‘good’ living room and worried much less about the dirt when someone wanted to light a fire in the fireplace...I would never have bought anything just because it was practical, wouldn’t show soil, or was guaranteed to last a lifetime.”
The other day, I was arguing that I should pack for college instead of going to an amusement park with my brothers and cousins. My aunt, however, likes to remind us that this is not a dress rehearsal. We should rejoice in things that make us smile instead of waiting till we think we deserve to. If we waste all of our time with a to-do list we will never find the what’s and the who’s that we love. The art of a “vice” is that you know what makes your heart (and your stomach) tick, thus you’ve already seen the light through the menagerie of monotony.
We are innately and unconditionally worthy of happiness. Life is as simple, and as complicated as that.
Tomorrow I leave for school and you can bet your bottom dollar that I’ll make a Starbucks stop. Nothing like a blonde roast coffee to ease the frenzy of moving in. Though I will never be able to criticize Dunkin Donuts, I can now better appreciate my roommate’s love for saying “Treat yo self.” Because we deserve it.
