Over a week ago I spilled coffee into the beige (not coffee-colored) carpeting. More precisely, I dumped the contents of a 12-ounce mug of coffee laced with fake sweetener, almond milk, and topped with a generous dollop (i.e., scoop) of fake whipped cream.
I was racing up the stairs when this happened. (Think Olga Korbut meets Kerri Strug...but not nearly as adorable or graceful.) I was also wearing flip flops and holding papers in my non-coffee mug-holding hand. The cat may also have been involved. What the hell, let's add the cat to this scenario.
After swiftly cycling through the seven words you can never say on television, I raced down the stairs for a fresh roll of paper towels and a bottle of seltzer. Dowse, blot, dowse, blot. Looked like I got everything. I left for a trip to Chicago (see the Storify here).
"You're probably going to have to call the carpet cleaning guy," my husband announced when he retrieved me at BWI. For the record, he didn't lay this news on me immediately. How could he? I'd swooped in first with my story about wandering into the men's room while reading crap on my phone. Smart phone. Me? Not so much, but that's another story.
Turns out seltzer, nectar of my Jewish upbringing, was the totally wrong thing to use. According to the carpet cleaning professional, it sets coffee stains and we might have to bring in the carpet repair professional who replaces sections of hopelessly damaged carpeting. So maybe I only imagined seltzer removing red wine from light carpeting back in the 1980s? Possibly. I imagined a lot of stuff during the drinking years.
Turns out coffee, in which I currently live and move and have my being, is somewhat eternal when it's spilled onto fibers. Not wanting to miss an opportunity to spiritualize this event, I'm trying to find God in this, of all things, but I can't even see the face of Christ in this damned spot.
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| Seeing the face of Christ? Yeah, me either. |
*I'm back. More about my hiatus in another post.
