Coffee Milk

If you would kindly consider thinking of the deepdark-pink-nearly-but-not-quite-red, mottled with white - -  what WAS that tabletop’s material? Formica? I simply do NOT know - - but it is where we ate most of our meals - - the oval shaped table with red covered seats and backs - - aluminum/chrome chairs; our # 1 daughter has it in her home right now; when we visit for family feasts it usually holds all the desserts.

But during (my) childhood times, it commanded the “breakfast room”.  That’s funny. Because we DID have a nice big dining room table in the dining room, but we saved that for Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s and Easter. Or some other rare very special occasion.  So we always ate on the lovely not quite red table.  Daddy sat at the head of the table, Mama to his left, my brother to her left.  My sister sat at Daddy’s right hand, just across from my mother.  I sat next to my sister, directly across from my brother.  Don’t know how they decided on the seating arrangement.  I remember it very distinctly, though. 

My mother was a good cook.  A really good cook.  Hmmm…I’ll talk about that another time…but for now let's talk about my father's "coffee milk".

I want to tell you something about why my father drank coffee the way he did.  And I imagine a lot of folks who lived through the depression and worked in areas like my dad did may have learned the same sort of things he did, in order to survive.  He had gone up to New York City from Atlanta because he had an offer of work which, although only occasional, paid a small amount.  He told me that in the morning he would go to the automat and choose a piece of buttered toast from the receptacle, take it to the counter and tell the attendant he also wanted his coffee refills, "Please".  The coffee, sugar, and evaporated milk refills were available since he had already purchased the toast and coffee.  He always poured in a lot of sugar (more calories) and as much milk as the cup would hold.  When the cup was about 2/3 empty, he would signal for a partial refill, so he could melt more sugar and replenish the canned milk from the shiny pitcher on the counter.  “About 11-12 ounces” (I had asked how much milk he drank at the automat. [I learned all this after I had grown up and moved out of the house, btw.])  “We did it for the food value.” 

On Sundays at the not-quite-red table, we often had pancakes, waffles – or the very best – French Toast – for breakfast.  And then we would sit there with our glasses of milk, untouched.  Daddy would sit there too, finally intoning “Does anyone want coffee milk this morning?”  Of course, three voices quickly answered in the affirmative.  So our glasses were handed forward, and he ceremoniously ladled a spoonful of his (generously sweet!) coffee into each of our glasses. 

Ahhh!  Sweet memories!