One of the best things I’ve done for myself lately is when I shelled out $125 bucks for a cappuccino maker. Now, in the world of capp makers I know a sawbuck+ is not a lot of money. But for me, actually, it is. Still, I broke my little piggy bank and splurged because I wanted to begin my days with more sense … and in the long run, more cents.

You see, for years, ever since leaving the North End of Boston, I’ve been drinking (and I know how lame this is, believe me), either a bottled Starbucks cold coffee (with a staggering 32 grams of sugar if I recall correctly), or I’ve been actually walking or driving to a local Starbucks and shelling out three to five dollars at a time for coffee that wasn’t all that great and which, the purchase of, was actually contrary to all that I believe in.

So you see, every day, I was starting off — beginning my day — with activities that weren’t really at all in alignment with my philosophies and/or the way I want to live and/or in ways that treat my body and my wallet and my planet well.

Driving a car to get a cup of coffee? Could there be anything more self-indulgent? Spending at least $4 on a cup of coffee that I could make at home for probably far less than a dollar on average? Outright cents-less! Buying coffee that comes in a paper cup with a plastic lid and then throwing them both away just 20 minutes later? Kind of criminal toward our planet. (I did begin taking my own container to Starbucks in my last days of going there.)

I don’t miss at all the use of fossil fuels to satisfy my caffeine jones. I don’t miss the mental grimace I always felt when I’d toss such unnecessary trash into the recycling containers. I don’t miss the jarring noises (even if the baristas and cashiers were nice and friendly) of the assembly-line coffee house barking out orders — “Venti Mocha Double Copa Light Whip Half Wit”.

And I definitely don’t miss the kind of eerie and unnerving feeling I always had waiting in line for the coffee I’d ordered — surrounded in close proximity by other people waiting there too, who rarely acknowledged the existence of others, just kind of numbly standing, all of us, just waiting for our little shot of joe, so we could all pile back into our cars. It just all felt so wasteful and honestly, a bit sad.

But now that I’ve bought my cappuccino maker, my mornings are so much more SANE. I greet the cat convention, prepare my coffee by my own hand, utilizing fresher ingredients, cutting calories by probably several hundred to next to nothing, knowing I’m saving literally hundreds and hundreds of dollars each year, feeling cleaner and more responsible in the amount of resources that are being expended in my quest for caffeine …

and I have a quiet cappuccino sitting in the sun room, watching blue jays flit to and away from the bird feeder, watching squirrels clamber up to the water basin, hearing the purring of Coco.

It’s all of ten or 15 minutes — but with such a simple, smart, and serene start … the day can only get better from here.