Nothing smells better in the morning than a fresh pot of coffee in the kitchen. The Gracious Mistress of the Parsonage has it set so that at a certain time in the morning, the coffee begins brewing and we wake up to that wonderful aroma.

I love my coffee in the morning and nothing gets me on the road better.

I did have a little glitch this past week. I had to go in for my yearly blood test. If you ever had your blood taken, you know you are not supposed to eat or drink anything after midnight in order for them to be able to take the correct blood sample. Even Count Dracula was not that demanding!

I did not think about it until when I get up that morning, the coffee was brewing, the aroma filled the house and I was ready for my first cup of coffee of the day. Then my wife looked at me and said, “Don’t you have a blood test this morning?”

My heart sank to the bottom of my feet. How can I begin the day without my morning cup of Joe?

When I went to the doctor’s office that morning I said to the nurse, “You are the bravest person I know.”

She looked at me rather quizzically and I explained. “Not having my morning coffee makes me a raging grouch of a person.” And I meant it.

She laughed and said, “That may be true, but I have the needle I’m going to stick in your arm.” With that, she laughed, but I did not return the merriment.

Upon leaving the doctor’s office, I went straight to McDonald’s for a cup of coffee. How I got there, I will never know. After several sips of coffee I seemed to settle down and become a rather decent sort of a person. Or, so I think.

I am not quite sure where I learned to love coffee so much. Growing up, my parents drank coffee, but it was that terrible instant coffee. How anybody can drink that is beyond me. For the longest time that is what I thought coffee tasted like and I did not want anything to do with that.

I distinctly remember the first time I had a real cup of coffee.

I was helping my grandfather with some lawn work and about midmorning he looked at me and said, “Son, how old are you?”

I thought it was a rather silly thing for my grandfather to ask, but I retorted with a cheerful “I’m 14, grandpa.”

“That’s good,” he said to me smiling, “you’re old enough for some real coffee, let’s go inside.”

That is when I was introduced to real coffee. To this day, I am not quite sure how he did it, but I know he put a lot of energy into his coffee. It was coffee perked on an old-fashioned wood stove in the kitchen.

So, I owe my love of coffee to my grandfather who knew how to make real coffee and not that artificial instant coffee my parents made.

Since that time, I have been enjoying coffee and perhaps, as my wife says, I have been enjoying it too much.

Not long ago about the middle of the morning, she looked at me while I was drinking a cup of coffee and asked a strange question. “How much coffee have you had today?”

For the life of me, I am not sure why she asked such a question, because nobody can have too much coffee.

Not sure how to answer, I very carefully said, “This is the only cup of coffee I remember drinking today.”

I find it wonderful getting old when you can blame everything on old age and forgetting things.

“I’m not so sure,” she said rather hesitatingly, “this is the third pot of coffee I made today.”

After all, who counts how much coffee they drink. One cup is as good as another cup. I am not the kind of person that discriminates about anything, especially coffee. Of course, if it is instant coffee, then I will discriminate.

“I think,” she said very seriously, “that you are a coffeeholic.”

That rather stunned me because I had never heard that word before. I am somewhat of a wordsmith and enjoy words and phrases, but this word, Coffeeholic, I had never heard before. At first, I thought maybe she was making it up. Upon a little bit of research, there is such a word.

She was not finished with her little coffee chat, “I think you are drinking too much coffee and should consider cutting back a little bit. Caffeine isn’t good for you.”

I am not sure where all that came from, but I will “think” about what she just said. I do not plan to do anything about it, because I think she would not like to be around someone like me who has not had his coffee for the day.

I have so many other things to think of, just like the apostle Paul said, “Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things” (Philippians 4:8).

This is what I am going to be thinking on, but not on cutting back on my coffee.