Deja Vu All Over Again

Those of you who read this post probably won’t be surprised at the event I am about to recall. If anything, I should be the surprised one, since you’re still here reading this blog, for reasons I can’t comprehend, since I’ve yet to bribe anybody to repeatedly view it just to inflate my hit count.

Anyway, let me preface the story by saying that I like to stop at Holiday and buy coffee in the morning. Obviously that’s not a cost effective move, since it would be cheaper to brew it at home, plus you'd eliminate the extra time needed to make the stop, which would allow for more time to sleep in. Still, I enjoy it all the same. I think it goes back to my childhood, where it was always a treat to go to the gas station and buy pop or comics or one-hundred penny candies for a dollar and then watch the cashier almost have a nervous breakdown. Call it recapturing my youth. Call it ignoring my future. Call it irresponsible fiscal policy. I call it tradition.

But on to the story, which I surprisingly haven’t forgotten about, despite my inane ramblings about my childhood.

As I alluded to, I’ve been stopping at Holiday quite often in the mornings. That is until late last week. I had just paid for my coffee when the cashier smiled and said, “See you tomorrow.”

Tomorrow?

It was like the world stopped spinning and time stood still. I was hit by a stunning moment of clarity, and I realized then that I was becoming too predictable, which is just another way of saying that I was becoming boring. It was Jimmy John’s all over again. (Second chance to catch up, if you missed it.) For the record, I haven’t been back to that particular Jimmy John’s since I posted about it over a year ago. That’s how stubborn I am about silly things such as these.

Not surprisingly, as I walked out of the store I thought well, I can’t come here anymore, and so far, I haven’t. I’ve gone as far as to start making my coffee at home and bringing it to work. Now, I have no illusions of boycotting this Holiday forever just because a cashier was polite and I took it as a dig on my lack of dynamism. At some point I’ll need gas, or I’ll run out of coffee at home, or I'll stop being crazy, or I’ll just want to watch people buy completely unhealthy breakfasts consisting of energy drinks or soda along with a half-dozen doughnuts, and so I’ll stop in.

But it’s still kind of scary that I’ve already gone this far and changed up my entire schedule just because I’m threatened by something somebody said that shouldn’t be threatening at all. I mean, what’s going to happen if I ever get married and my wife says, "See you tonight," as I leave for work in the morning? Will I immediately think, well, I can’t come here anymore? (All right, that’s probably a bad example, I hope, but my point remains.)

I guess it’s just something I’ll have to work on. My mantra will be that routines don’t necessarily mean that one is boring. Perhaps I’ll start by going back to that Holiday once a week for coffee. At first I’ll be like a deer, very tentative and ready to flee at the slightest disturbance, such as a loud truck in the parking lot or the cashier smiling at me. But I’ll slowly gain confidence and maybe build up to going twice a week, and then see where it takes me.

I'm pretty sure I can make some progress. Heck, who knows, maybe I’ll end up doing something really crazy. Maybe I’ll go back to Jimmy John’s. But don't bet on it.