Chapter 47
Can you imagine how bleak and bland the world would be without our coffee?
We invite friends over for coffee; we call our informal get-togethers, coffees; we go to coffee with a friend; and we have coffee breaks at mid-morning and mid-afternoon.
Mercy!!! We just wouldn’t have a social life at all without coffee! !
My mother always said the stuff would turn our toenails black if we drank it before we were “fully growed up”!
And we were vain little critters who had no intentions of wandering about on the face of the earth with something so terrible as black toenails.
So, we steered away from it like it was pure, unadulterated poison.
However, when I got a little older, I figured the “cool” people drank coffee so my girlfriend and I decided we’d learn the art of drinking it. But if our toenails began to turn even a faint shade of beige, we would give it up!! No questions asked or second chances!
HER grandma taught her to use a little sugar and cream to help her swallow the itsy-bitsy sip without choking to death. My granny didn’t believe in puttin’ sugar coatin’ on anything. If you wanted to drink coffee you took it like it was—black!
That was way back in yonder years when coffee was a necessity and not a luxury. Grannie had this old blue granite that held about a half-gallon of water. She’d fill it up to the top and pour in one level cup of grounds. When it was boiled down to about half full it was ready to drink.
You didn’t dare stir it with a spoon. To begin with it was thick enough to make stirring virtually impossible and it was strong enough to melt the spoon if you did get in a few swishes.
And you surely did NOT hold it in your mouth before you swallowed it either.
It could take tooth enamel off slicker’n skimmin’ crud off a Louisiana swamp!
! (I always wonder if that’s what happened to Grannie’s teeth.
She never had any as long as I knew her and she drank her fair share of it!)
To say the least, I did not learn to drink coffee. Not for many years. There did come a day after the rage of Mr. Coffee machines, though, that I could manage a few sips—I guess I was just a social drinker.
Then, presto, bingo, and whoopee! The price shot up to three dollars a pound.
Now, let me tell you, I may not be one much for the necessities of life, but I sure do enjoy the luxuries and at $3.
00 a pound, it was a luxury!! So, I immediately took likin’ to it! Anything that expensive had to be good.
Before long, I was like all other true-blooded Americans. I didn’t open my eyes until I started my second cup in the mornings. I learned to dust, vacuum and load the dishwasher all with one hand so I could hold a cup of coffee with the other one!
But still yet, when I take my bath, I instinctively check my toenails—So far, so good…