I Have Become That Person I Said I Would Not Be!

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As I sit here, sipping a cup of tea, I’m reminded of a subject that @TheSojourner and I have mentioned a few times. There is an unwritten rule in the Navy (and I assume in other branches of the military), and it’s one you’d better learn quickly if you’re a little seaman recruit (or in charge of the coffee mess….especially if you’re in charge of the coffee mess!). That rule is, “Thou shalt NOT clean the coffee pot or a coffee cup.” One morning I told my master chief that, since I had nothing to do, I was going to clean the coffee pot. The master chief, who was from L.A. (Lower Alabama) nearly came out of his chair and said, with his pronounced southern drawl, “If you go near that coffee pot to clean it I’ll court-martial you!” When I was stationed in Jacksonville there was a guy in our office who had a coffee cup that, I kid you not, was BLACK on the inside and cream white on the outside. When I asked why he’d never cleaned it, he said, “It’s a status symbol. The deeper your coffee stain, the better sailor you are.” (Of course, I had to ask my brother, who’d been in for about eight years by this time. He said, “Nah, the deeper the coffee stain the longer you’ve been in the Navy.” ) Anyway, I made my mind up. I’ll never do that. Guess what. I’ve become that person I said I wouldn’t be. Attached is a photo of the inside of my tea mug. No, it doesn’t make me a good sailor. It doesn’t make me lazy. It’s just simple rationale: tea is going to stain the cup, so why bother. So here’s to that old PH1 who I used to chide for his messy coffee cup. Thanks for showing me the way, even if it did take 42 years for me to see the light. My favorite reference to coffee in a song comes from Squeeze: