My Kryptonite*

 

* The definition of kryptonite is Superman's ultimate weakness, or anything that causes someone's ultimate weakness. An example of kryptonite is the one food a person is seriously allergic to.

{This word was added to the dictionary in September 2018. Kryptonite referred to a mineral from the planet Krypton that had an extremely harmful effect on Superman.}

 

Well, no Superperson, me. But to each humble mortal a Kryptonite must needs be.

 

Mine is rather odd, as it is not a thing but a lack of a thing. The thing I must not lack if I am to be producing original writing (or thought, craft item, or a genuine smile) is caffeine. Put it another way: I need my coffee or black tea, and you may report me to the authorities as a bonafide addict. But while you snitch on me, I should add that it is my only addiction, if that makes a difference.

 

It gladdens my heart to read studies that confirm caffeine consumers live (on average) longer. It staves off Alzheimer’s and increases IQ by a statistically significant measure. Not such a terrible dependency as such goes.

 

I also stick to two-three cups a day, always before four in the afternoon. Well, almost always. If I have to drive later or stay awake, I break the before-four rule. Thus, I do my best not to have to drive later and also excuse myself from activities that ask me to be perky after dinner. If you’ve ever asked me to come to a lecture at such late hour, now you know why I said ‘no.’ On the other hand, if you asked me to meet you for coffee in the morning hours, now you know why I almost always said ‘yes.’

 

Confessions time over. I have to get back to my coffee now.

My Only Addiction

It’s too easy to look down on addicts. If you have never experienced such an affliction, you can feel smugly superior to the poor souls who allowed themselves to succumb. How pathetic they are, and how low they descend, risking everything for a fix.

I don’t seem to have the personality or misfortune to have had such challenges.

The first is a matter of propensity over which anyone can make decisions not to risk exposure. Long ago, at the age of five or six, I watched my nicotine-dependent father go out on a stormy, drenching rainy Friday night, hail a cab (expensive) to the outskirts of town, (Jerusalem) where the one and only small kiosk sold cigarettes on the Sabbath. He thought he had stashed an extra pack, but couldn’t find it.

It was a lesson in what not to do. No cigarettes, ever. Don’t want to have to haul that monkey on my back.

The second, the matter of luck, has to do with things that can happen and leave a person dependent. With two herniated discs in my lower back, I remember realizing how addiction to painkillers can start, and how understandable and insidious the process is.
That was two years plus ago. When my doctor prescribed narcotics, I never took them. I chose not to haul that monkey on my miserably aching back, either. But some folks don’t know what the doctor had given them before it’s too late, and the climb out of that hole is steep.

But I don’t feel superior, because I do have a sort of addiction, or maybe it’s closer to a dependence. Can you guess to what?

Yes, I can stop. I did without difficulty while pregnant. Twice.

And, NO, I don’t want to.

So there. Maybe this feeling of "I *need* my coffee" gives me a peek into addiction, and maybe what I really need is that insight and compassion in addition to the caffeine. Because smugness is unattractive and worse.

Oh, and one other thing--