2022 In Coffee Cups
I'm not gonna lie, I'm glad to see the end of 2022. It has been one of the worst years for me in memory. I'm quite sure I'm not the only one. It was a year of great financial loss, war, global economic disaster, illness, and so on. I did manage to travel a few times, which was great, but overall I think I want a refund.
I drink a lot of coffee. That was one constant in 2022 perhaps with the exception of January. I decided to do a recap post of the year showing cups of coffee I drank during some pivotal or landmark moments in the year.
Jan.
This is actually a lie. This very cup was sipped on the very last day, perhaps even the last few minutes of December 2021 because I gave up coffee for the month of January. I believe the withdrawals from that challenge, along with low levels of Vitamin D and low blood sugar, having also given up refined sugars and flour, ended up being too much for my system. Next time I do something like this, it would be more gradual.
Feb.
This was the first place I visited in the year, and this was my first cup early in the morning while everyone else was asleep. I had to get some air since being indoors for more than an hour sparked some bizarre claustrophobic feelings. I was, at that point, just starting to recover from something that hit me pretty badly. It was a pretty low point. Apart from my health and immune system being compromised, I was also hit with two bits of devastating family news. This added mental and emotional dimensions to an already terrible package. Getting away in nature surely did help me - the fresh air and serenity of the countryside at least reduced my claustrophobia and anxiety.
Mar.
This was one of the best cups of coffee I drank in 2022. I remember this day like it was yesterday. I had recovered from my non-symptomatic Covid infection and the UK government was ramping down Covid measures. Things had started to get back to normalcy slowly and spring was in the air. It was a beautiful day.
Apr.
All Covid restrictions had ended in the UK, including travel related ones, and life was pretty much back to normal. My health and fitness were back on track and I was feeling good, even if a little less wealthy than previous months. I had spent a good majority of my liquid funds helping out with family problems and emergencies. It took a lot out of me, but I was glad I was able to help. That's what family's for after all. As long we have life, we can rebuild.
May.
This was a bad day. It was the day after the Luna collapse, of which I had a sizeable investment. I wasn't able to react quickly enough because I was driving my dad to physio when it all went down. In typical fashion, the exchanges had pretty much locked out the retail investors out while the billionaires got their money out. It's never that blatant, otherwise we'd sue, but it's obvious. It was a bad day across the board. It was much worse for some people, so much so that some ended it all. I personally know someone who lost millions of dollars. It kind of put my loss in perspective. Again, as long as we have life, we can rebuild.
Jun.
This was a good day. I was in the perfect place, in the perfect weather, drinking an ok cup of espresso. I could no longer afford to emigrate to that country, as I had contemplated before the double whammy of BREXIT and COVID, but it was still a joy to be there. The air, the cool wind of the Atlantic, was fresh and familiar. I was happy on this day and I remember this cup of mediocre espresso like it was yesterday.
Jul.
This was my first cup from my Nespresso machine. I had purchased it after having access to it in June (above). I started an entire YouTube channel to make videos about the Nespresso. It was a piece of happiness that reminded me of the Canary Islands. Any time I drink from this machine, I smell the Atlantic Ocean.
Aug.
This was a great day. It was perhaps the second best coffee I had in 2022. The company was perfect too - my artsy friend and her boyfriend. We had dinner at a Turkish restaurant and this was my dessert coffee. It was absolutely outstanding.
Sep.
This was a good day. I had been walking for 5 hours straight when it started to rain. I dipped into this cafe to avoid getting drenched and it was a nice time watching people go about their business. I had a lot of time to think about new strategies going forward. It was sort of an unplanned cup, but an important one in the end. A couple of projects were conceived in my head while drinking this cup.
Oct.
This Lungo was made in my Nespresso and was perhaps, to date, the best drink out of that machine. The pods were made from Ugandan coffee and it just tasted amazing to me. It was kind of like Kenyan coffee, but slightly better. It's hard to explain.
Nov.
I had a super-last-minute meeting with a couple of amazing friends in a very cool place in Hammersmith. This was the coffee I had after that dinner. It's always great to see old friends.
Dec.
Well, this was today. This was my breakfast actually - a slice of good cake and a cup of dark roasted and rich coffee. It's the final day of 2022. At the post of writing this, close to midday, some parts of the planet are making welcoming the new year already. In fact, Tonga and Samoa are already an hour deep into 2023. This is totally arbitrary, of course, because we measure time globally with London (Greenwich Meridian time specifically) as the reference point.
So, as for most people, it has been a net-negative year but with some positives here and there. Lessons have been learnt and I am grateful to be here still. Many haven't made it through. Looking forward to 2023 and I do hope things improve. I know doom has been predicted for next year by the "experts", but I think we have some good times ahead. Remember people thought 2020 was going to be a "great year" - see what happened. Nobody knows the future. To an extent, we create our own futures based on present and past actions. I choose to look to the bright side and hope for a great 2023 and wish you all the same.
Happy New Year
Peace & Love,
Adé