Confession...

So since the majority of people who read my blog are family they obviously know that I grew up in a Mormon home. I don't know what to classify myself as these days...not Mormon so much but not anything else either. The old term "Jack Mormon" doesn't seem to apply because I don't go to church or necessarily know what I believe when it comes to the religion as a whole. It's just part of who I am at this point. When people ask what religion I am I usually respond with "I grew up Mormon"..."I used to be Mormon"..."my whole family is Mormon"...or simply "I don't go to Church". I don't really consider myself Mormon since a requirement of that means going to church and following all the rules of the roost so to speak. I don't know how to explain it really.

I guess an example could be like hair color. This makes sense to me because #1 I am known for coloring my hair quite a bit in the past and #2 I don't currently have a hair color anywhere near my natural color. So I am naturally blonde. For my whole life I have had a dirty blonde hair color...usually hidden beneath whatever color it happens to be at the moment. When I see pictures of myself as a kid I have blonde hair...So I guess you would say "I am a blonde". When I think of myself I usually think of myself as a blonde I suppose, but I am not blonde and I have not been blonde in a really long time. Does this make sense? And to further the analogy even more, when I have been blonde in recent years...it's not the blonde I was born with...it's not the blonde that grows in at the root. It's part of who I am, who I used to, who I grew up knowing but it's not necessarily who I am today...but I know it's part of me. I guess I kinda feel that way about being Mormon. I think when you are raised a specific way, and being Mormon is very specific, you can't help but have certain aspects of your way of thinking be forever influenced by it. Like how I am 30 years old and I feel like I am really old to not be married and I definitely thought I would have more than 1 child by this age. But the topic of this post is not Religion. I guess I used it as a segway into the real topic...Caffeine...lots and lots of Caffeine.

So as you know Mormons are not supposed to drink or do drugs. And growing up I was always told that Caffeine was a drug and since it tends to be in a lot of pain relief medication I guess this is true. So this means that growing up I was not supposed to have any soda with caffeine in it. So basically no brown soda...well with the exception of Root Beer. I remember the first time I had Coca Cola. The neighbors across the street from us "the Almonds" invited me to go to the movies with them...they had 3 girls, one my age. I remember we went to see the movie "Hot to Trot"...which was something about a talking horse. Anyways with the popcorn and candy there also came a fountain drink and it was Coke. I didn't know what it was when I took a swig...I don't think I even realized there were other sodas besides sprite and root beer. And it tasted good!!!! I don't remember if I told my parents about it or not. But it would still be a few years away before I would really develop "feelings" for Coca Cola Classic.

Starting in 4th grade and up to about 10th Grade I had a best friend named Danielle. She was basically an only child since her only sibling was like 12 or 15 years older than her. I played with Danielle everyday, spent the night over almost every weekend. She had a pool and her Dad worked for the Sacramento Kings and we would go to games and run around in the back of the Arco Arena or up in her dad's office. Danielle also always had Coke. ALWAYS!!!!! There was always a ton of it in the fridge and we would just drink it like water. I don't think my mom ever knew and it's not like she could have stopped me from drinking it when she wasn't around. That is when I would say I really became a caffeine drinker. And by jr high and high school I would say most Mormon kids drink caffeinated sodas, even though technically you aren't supposed to. It was like ehhhh not huge on the sin list for teenagers...there were bigger things to worry about. But it was always just soda...energy drinks didn't come on the scene til much later and of course "coffee" was like "the devil". It was like the main concensus that by not drinking caffeine they really meant...don't drink coffee...it was like sodas didn't count.

And here we arrive at the confession... I like and drink Coffee...and the Mormon in me feels so ashamed of this, lol.

After high school and after becoming inactive in church I never had friends or roommates who were Coffee drinkers so I never much thought about it. I also spent my Senior year of high school making pot after pot of Coffee for the Lawyers office I worked at and the smell of it just grossed me out. Then one day about 3 years ago while I was working in Santa Barbara at a swanky hotel one of my co-workers was like "hey I'm running to Starbucks do you want anything"...I was thinking ummmmm panic...what do I say? I tried to refuse but she insisted and insisted and finally I racked my brain for the name of something at a Coffee Shop so I didn't seem like an uncool, unsophisticated geek...."ummmm okay a small Carmel macciatto". This was a drink a former co-worker at WalMart would always order...I had no idea what it was but if there was carmel in it...it should be at least sweet right? She brought it back and it was not great to be honest. But I drank it because I didn't want to hurt her feelings or feel left out. And then I would drink Coffee here and there when it was offered because it did seem to zing you awake...it had a much more awakening affect than just soda. But I would not say I really was a coffee drinker...yet, nor did I enjoy the taste if it.

Then I got pregnant..so I didn't drink it. But after being pregnant I was of course living with Mitch's family and I was once again offered it. And I also discovered something that made it taste much better. Coffee Creamer flavored with an array of different things. I started to drink Coffee the way the family teased Mitch's mom about..."sandbar bottom" which basically means coffee with creamer and a ton of sugar...hence the "sandy bottom". It began to taste better to me and I appreciated it's ability to wake me up. And that was it. However my family didn't know it and anytime it accidentally came up I felt really embarrassed. I remember last year at the family vacation in Tahoe my brother needing to find a wifi connection and I said there was probably one at Starbucks up the street...then Mitch said "oh yeah Emily you could get a coffee since you have been missing it all week". Everyone looked at me...or it felt like everyone looked at me in shock and I felt so embarrassed. But seeing how my brother and dad have periods of time when they live on energy drinks I don't know why I felt so judged since Coffee probably has less caffeine than Redbull or Rockstar or Monster. I mean my family knows that there were points in my life where I drank alcohol frequently...I mean I obviously have a child out of wedlock so you can do the math on that. But for some reason the Coffee thing felt so shameful.

Here is why...I think. I think Coffee seems like such a normal habit type of a thing. Something Mormons just don't do. And maybe seeing me as a Coffee drinker really paints a picture of a different kind of life. And obviously I do have different life. I guess maybe the realization of that is what really makes me feel guilty. That maybe it's not just about being stubborn or rebellious maybe I just won't ever be "blonde" again...the idea that that probably hurts my family makes me feel bad because it isn't a topic I have ever really addressed, nor want to address with them. I know they aren't "giving up on me"...but I don't always understand why they feel the need to hold on to that so much. I guess to me it doesn't feel like something that matters...I don't know. But there you go....

I LIKE COFFEE!