Moving isn't easy.
There are many many changes.
Lot's of things to get used to.
Especially when Everything has changed.
I'm thankful though.
I'm thankful for the move
and for what it means in our lives.
We are continuing down a course that isn't easy
but one that we feel drawn to.
It's funny that coffee is the field that I ended up in.
It is so far from where I started,
or would have ever guessed my life to go.
It was 10 years ago this spring that I started to drink coffee.
Previous to that I was in darkness.
I did not like coffee.
In fact, I hated it.
But through the community of wilderness guides I was around during the previous summer
I thought I'd open myself up to the idea.
I still didn't like it.
It wasn't until I packed up my rusty 500-dollar rusty pick up and moved out to Bellingham WA
that I really began liking it.
I guess it wasn't really in my time in Bellingham
but on my hitch-hiking trips down to Seattle.
I'd catch up with my best friend who had an apartment down there
and we'd go out to Cafe Europa and get americanos and fresh baked raspberry muffins.
We'd hang out at the cafe for hours.
Americanos got me hooked.
I'd always start drinking it black
but then after a quarter of the cup I'd start pouring cream in.
And I'd add more as I'd drink.
At the beginning of the drink it was all coffee, no cream.
By the end it would be nearly all cream and just a drop of coffee.
Ha.
Fastforward a year and I was back in Minnesota working at a coffee shop as a barista.
I was trained by this guy named Connor.
He was seriously the best trainer.
He knew everything and he could explain how to do it.
I really got into steaming milk and trying to make the perfect drink.
At this point it was 2006
and I'm sure the 3rd wave of coffee was well in effect on the coasts
but in Minnesota it still hadn't hit.
So my perfect drink was still very 2nd wave.
Soapy foam.
Harsh, over-extracted espresso.
But even still, I began to love coffee.
What stuck out to me was not so much the taste
because I was still getting used to that,
it was the process.
I have always loved the process of making coffee.
In late spring I bought a french press from work.
One that I still have.
And I used it for the next several years of wilderness guiding,
waking up in the morning and making myself coffee over the fire,
in the dog days of summer
and the deep winter.
After that,
I was hooked.
There are many many changes.
Lot's of things to get used to.
Especially when Everything has changed.
I'm thankful though.
I'm thankful for the move
and for what it means in our lives.
We are continuing down a course that isn't easy
but one that we feel drawn to.
It's funny that coffee is the field that I ended up in.
It is so far from where I started,
or would have ever guessed my life to go.
It was 10 years ago this spring that I started to drink coffee.
Previous to that I was in darkness.
I did not like coffee.
In fact, I hated it.
But through the community of wilderness guides I was around during the previous summer
I thought I'd open myself up to the idea.
I still didn't like it.
It wasn't until I packed up my rusty 500-dollar rusty pick up and moved out to Bellingham WA
that I really began liking it.
I guess it wasn't really in my time in Bellingham
but on my hitch-hiking trips down to Seattle.
I'd catch up with my best friend who had an apartment down there
and we'd go out to Cafe Europa and get americanos and fresh baked raspberry muffins.
We'd hang out at the cafe for hours.
Americanos got me hooked.
I'd always start drinking it black
but then after a quarter of the cup I'd start pouring cream in.
And I'd add more as I'd drink.
At the beginning of the drink it was all coffee, no cream.
By the end it would be nearly all cream and just a drop of coffee.
Ha.
Fastforward a year and I was back in Minnesota working at a coffee shop as a barista.
I was trained by this guy named Connor.
He was seriously the best trainer.
He knew everything and he could explain how to do it.
I really got into steaming milk and trying to make the perfect drink.
At this point it was 2006
and I'm sure the 3rd wave of coffee was well in effect on the coasts
but in Minnesota it still hadn't hit.
So my perfect drink was still very 2nd wave.
Soapy foam.
Harsh, over-extracted espresso.
But even still, I began to love coffee.
What stuck out to me was not so much the taste
because I was still getting used to that,
it was the process.
I have always loved the process of making coffee.
In late spring I bought a french press from work.
One that I still have.
And I used it for the next several years of wilderness guiding,
waking up in the morning and making myself coffee over the fire,
in the dog days of summer
and the deep winter.
After that,
I was hooked.