Wake Up and Smell the Aftertaste

The following is my resignation from my office job:

Coffee is a delicious, yet interesting drink. It smells rich, wonderful, and welcoming, yet the thing I find most intriguing about coffee is how it is made. You take coffee beans from countries around the world and grind them up into a powdery substance. You then filter hot water through them and the result is coffee. But isn’t it even more intriguing how easy it is to do this wrong? There are coffee beans sold in stores that have been ground up for months. They are no longer fresh and I don’t know about anyone else—but I can tell.

I like my coffee a little sweet and a lot bitter. It has to be “drinkably” hot, a temperature that is hard to achieve and maintain. I guess you can call me a certified “coffee-snob.” Consequently, I know when it is done right and when it is just wrong.

At the office, we make Folgers—a coffee I consider to be at the bottom of the heap. It’s pre-ground and the taste is nothing like the coffee I have learned to appreciate. It is my job to make this crap for everyone in the office each morning. The thing that kills me is as I’m scooping out those grounds I am intoxicated by the smell and even though I know the end result will be horrible, I still think I’m craving it.

I have tried it before (it was a desperate morning pick-me-up situation) and it is almost like a trick. It’s hot and smells wonderful, but when you touch it to your lips you think something is different—wrong. At first it tastes alright, but it’s the aftertaste that comes up to viciously bite your tongue.

I haven’t tried it again since, probably because I have learned from that experience. Yet each morning I still find myself holding those grounds up to my nose wishing that their result was what I was looking for.

That’s how I feel about this job; it is Folgers coffee. Walking in, my first impression was that it was beautiful and prestigious. There are many offices (not just one) and there are even conference rooms in which to hold the meetings. (Oh, and are there meetings!) There are small meetings and large ones—two people or ten. This whole office is based on the idea of holding a meeting.

I guess the point I’m trying to make is that when you smell LFOS grounds, they seem like they would make a delicious cup of coffee, but they just don’t end up living up to what you expected. It’s the aftertaste that comes right up to bite you—the arguing, the negativity, the meetings about meetings about what to do at the next meeting.

I came into this job taking a big deep breath of coffee smell—I thought it would be what I needed. I’m leaving today to wash that aftertaste out of my mouth and go in pursuit of a coffee that is more suited to my needs.

I know this resignation letter seems weird—but it was the only way I could do this and do it right. This is my way of doing things and I hope you all understand. Good luck with your future and I hope this letter inspires you to make your life what you need it to be—coffee that not only smells wonderful, but tastes exactly the way you need it to.