A couple of years ago, I took advantage of a depressed economy and went to eBay, looking for one of those fancy push-button espresso machines. You know the ones, they hold a tank of water, a hopper of beans and have steam at the ready. All you have to do is care and feed them, and you get a great cup of coffee just by pushing a button. Having one of these machines is an extravagance. An indulgence. When you see them in the Sur La Table catalog, you think “Oh no! Not for me! I’m never going to need such a thing. Way too fancy. Who needs a cup of coffee at the push of a button?!” Then, of course, you experience it … you see one at a friend’s house, or an employer installs one, and you think “Huh. Gotta have me one of these!”
They are outrageously expensive. (Unless you go on eBay and find a lovely little retailer in, let’s say, Las Vegas, who bought a bunch of them and then went belly up. I think this poor soul had a garage full of the machines, because he let me have it for … well … a song.) At any rate, there you are with your fancy machine and you come to realize it needs to be cared for. There’s an occasional bean restock. There’s a more-than-occasional water tank refresh, and tray dump of grounds (and collected caffeinated sludge). And … if you live where I do … there’s a need to change a water filter after every 250 cups of coffee.
My machine has an LED screen that tells you what the machine is up to or what you need to do. You know, short phrases like — 2 coffees xstrong. 1 coffee powder. Press rinse. Draw steam. Fill beans. Fill tank. Empty tray. Clean machine. Change filter.
If you’re like me (and I know you are) you probably read the Change filter warning, but wait until you’ve gotten every bit of life out of that filter. (The little fucker is expensive. And hard to find.) The machine knows you. It can sense you are this type of person. The machine probably knows you ignore the low-ink alert on your printer, or leave for the coast with a quarter tank of gas. Because the machine knows you so well. (It’s seen you at your best and your worst, after all), this clever little machine … this kitchen marvel … this what-would-I-do-without-it device … has the audacity to switch it’s message from the kindly Change filter to the more demanding Change Now. (Note the use of capitalization.)
Change Now, it tells you. It beeps three times for the next several cups of coffee. Change Now it reads, instead of the time of day, or the ever-comforting 2 coffees xstrong. It then beeps five times and changes to all caps:
CHANGE NOW
It means business this time. It’s not fooling around. Eventually, it withholds your cup of coffee. Bastard machine.
There you are in your favorite comfy t-shirt and boxers. Hugging off the bleary cold of the morning. Waiting as patiently as you can for your 2 coffees xstrong. Surprised. Shocked. Dismayed. Crestfallen.
So, being this type of guy (and I just know you are exactly like me) you get over the initial shock of not having your wishes fulfilled and you … make the change. You CHANGE NOW. And, regardless of how comfortable you are with your own insecurities, you admonish yourself for becoming reliant on something that is inherently unreliable. Something you have endowed with the ability to make decisions on your behalf, even if they are decisions which do not work in your favor.
You get over yourself. You soldier on. You learn a little something about loyalty and trust. And, after a brief period of uncomfortability, you get your reward. But, in the future, when the universe is sending you messages so strong that even your coffee machine is offering advice and counsel, well … you Change filter. I mean, why wait?
So, since we are so alike, you and I, you can imagine my surprise when … almost a month ago … I was laid off from my (really great) job of eleven years. Despite the warnings. The capitalization. The beeps. You find me (or return to me) in the process of CHANGE NOW. And no matter how much I cross my fingers, cross my toes, pull on my ears or wiggle my nose, I approach the simple act of pushing the buttons of opportunity with caution.
I’m a little shocky. I’m a little bleary. But I’m still pretty grateful the coffee has been so good for more than a decade.
I love you.
Excellent Grant! We all get these progressively stronger messages that we deny or ignore because the whole thing has been working so well for OUR needs for so long that we forget or suppress the fact that the machine has needs of its own that after being ignored, eventually smacks us in the face.
I really hope you find something that works even better for you than the fancy-ass little coffee machine!
Sandy
I am just exactly like you! (Which you probably already knew.) But after so many years of hanging out together, I also know that your next cup of coffee is going to be equally as good. Different. But just as good. Because you know how to find the good coffee and the people who MAKE the good coffee want you drinking it!