124. Coffee

           

            This morning as I sit here at my kitchen counter contemplating my day. I am sipping on a cup of coffee. Like a good portion of Americans that is my habit. That has been our habit since the Massachusetts colonists had had their fill of British taxes thrust upon them without any representation or voice in the matter. They took the shipments of tea, what had been their national drink, and threw it into the harbor. We have known that as the Boston Tea Party ever since. And we have taken our trade to southerly parts of the world and become a coffee drinking nation since that time.

            I like coffee. I drink mine black, though I will occasionally stop by an espresso shop and order a mocha. I like using coffee as a means to meet with friends to sit around a table and just chat about life. I like drinking two or three cups every morning before I step out into the world and make my way to work where I hope to spread the wealth and joy of our language with young women and young men. I want to say coffee sustains me, but of course that isn’t true. Coffee just helps me wake up and gives me an excuse to take time to contemplate my day. Coffee helps me connect with others. Coffee gives me pause after church to contemplate God. Coffee, while perhaps not being my sustenance, is the thing that provides a structure for those things that do sustain me.

            And I live in the Northwest so coffee gives structure to all the cities and towns of where I live. Even little towns of less than a thousand people have little drive through espresso shops. We love our coffee where there’s only enough MJB for the west. We live where we like to think the best part of waking up is Folgers in a cup. (It isn’t, but some people might think so.) We live where our literary heroes (from Moby Dick) are emblazoned on our coffee companies: Starbucks. We live where Maxwell House is good to the last drop. But whether you are a Dunkin’ Donuts man or a Seattle’s Best woman or someone who lives for the Green Mountain brew, there’s just something about coffee that acknowledges our American identity. For all of our divisions, let us come together around a cup of coffee.