My sister Glory has always been an overachiever with boundless energy and drive. Ever since we were kids, she was the hyper one - the first one up in the morning and the last one to finally wind down at night. Our parents just chalked it up to her having a motor that never stopped running.
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While that energizer bunny persona was sometimes annoying when we had to share a bedroom growing up, I can't say I'm too surprised that it has carried into her adult life and career. Glory is one of those people who lives to work rather than works to live. She's built her own business as a seamstress and clothing designer, and she throws herself into every project and custom order with intense focus and attention to detail.
What does surprise me, though, is the utterly baffling way she fuels that workaholic fire: an absolute obscene amount of coffee consumption.
I'm talking multi-pot a day levels of coffee here, people. It's not unusual at all for Glory to easily down 10 or 12 cups before the sun has even set. If she's really in a caffeine-fueled groove working on a big project, making a fresh pot is about as frequent as most people having to go to the bathroom.
Just watching her consume it is mind-boggling. She doesn't even seem to taste or enjoy the coffee at all - it's simply jet fuel for her body and brain to keep cranking away at her craft. She'll chug down a fresh mugful while it's still hot enough to burn a normal person's mouth. Then she'll immediately refill it and start slamming that next cup too.
When I've confronted her about her excessive coffee intake over the years, her justification is always the same: "It keeps me awake and focused so I can get my work done on time!" As if operating in a state of double-digit daily caffeine consumption is somehow healthy or sustainable. As if the crashing comedowns and jittery over-alertness is somehow increasing her productivity and creativity.
Yet Glory swears up and down that it's the only way for her to stay on top of her huge workload and meet tight deadlines. If she doesn't keep the coffee river flowing all day and most of the night, she gets behind and clients get upset. Caffeine is as essential to her as any other utility or tool of her trade.
To be fair, she is running a thriving small business that requires extremely long hours doing painstaking detail work. So I get that she needs to find a way to push through and stay motivated. But my sister has taken it to such an extreme, scientifically inadvisable level that it borders on caffeine abuse or addiction. Frankly, it's gotten to where her coffee habits are more than a little worrisome from a health standpoint.
Besides the ridiculous physical quantity she's putting into her body, the erratic timing of her coffee consumption is also pretty puzzling and chaotic. Glory doesn't seem to follow any discernible schedule - she'll slam back 4 or 5 cups rapidfire in the morning, then maybe lag for a couple of hours in the afternoon before being struck by another caffeine craving out of nowhere and chugging 3 more cups like a frat bro doing keg stands.
And that's to say nothing of the impact it has on her sleep schedule, which is totally scattershot depending on how long her chemical fuel reserves last on any given day. Some nights she'll be up to all hours putting in overtime because the coffee has her wired. Other nights she'll crash hard from the comedown and pass out on her sewing machine by 8pm. The human body was not meant to be subjected to such dramatic chemical ebbs and flows.
Meanwhile, the rest of us mere mortals are over here sipping our single, reasonably-sized cup of joe in the morning and being done with it. We watch in bewildered amazement as Glory seems to have traded drinking coffee for hydration and sustenance at this point. Her penchant for caffeine is staggering.
I just hope she's at least getting her money's worth for how much she's spending on all those beans and grounds. Or better yet, maybe she can start investing in a coffee plantation at this point - vertical integration could be the key to keeping her considerable coffee habit afloat financially. Because something tells me the Caffeine Queen has no plans to abdicate her throne anytime soon.
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