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Benefit

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At 6:00 am my head is starting to feel like a clamp is being slowly tighten. After my shower and getting dressed, my head is pounding. I put on the water to boil and grind the whole beans. The high pitched motor of the grinder is my wife's alarm clock. She gets out of bed and asks, "Put enough water on for me." Like a crack addict who craves the ritual more than the substance, we have our routine to start the day that involves one cup of coffee for each of us. After being whole pot coffee drinkers, we bought a french press and high quality coffee. We drink our cups slowly and savor every sip.
My headache is because I broke the one cup coffee rule. This week at a conference that was boring as waiting for a delayed flight, I drank several cups of coffee and ate over a dozen cookies a day for three days. As long as we stick to a cup or even two, coffee is a great benefit. It brings my wife and I together for a nice talk in the morning before we go out to our day.
Coffee is a connector. As people meet for a drink in the evening, people also meet over coffee in the morning in the office and make business deals and meet in coffee shops and discuss politics.
Every morning across small town America farmers get together after morning chores and discuss the weather, forecasts, yield, and prices with waitresses pouring our coffee. Construction workers get their thermos bottles filled with coffee as they go out to battle the cold up high above the skylines of cities. Busniss people are going through drive-up windows to get thier favorite coffee drink.
It doesn't work to discuss a million dollar sale over apple juice or a soft drink. Intimate discussions that take place between close friends don't happen over ice water but after bar hopping all night and then sitting at a 24 hour restaurant with endless cups of coffee until the sun comes up.
Coffee is about sharing your heart with someone and walking away knowing that you have connected with another human. The drink for such a meeting has to be deep and dignified. A fresh roasted dark cup of coffe is the only drink for such a meeting.

Learn more about this author, Tom Engel.
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