A Cup of Coffee From the Past

          It was 45 plus years ago when a yellow school bus pulled into the parking lot of a restaurant outside Devil's Lake in Wisconsin.  The door swung open and out stepped and/or tripped or slid a group of high school music students who had spent the entire day competing at the state music competitions in  Madison, WI. We were giddy from the emotions of the day and the long hours that we'd put in getting there, waiting, performing and waiting for results and now the long ride home.  We had been awarded a first for our madrigal and we were the rulers of our world in that moment.  And I for one needed something I'd tried only once before and so when the waitress came to the booth and asked if I'd like a cup of coffee I somewhat nervously said, "yes". Then she asked if I wanted cream and sugar and I didn't have a clue so I just said, "No, black is fine."

 Most of you may not understand but in the world I grew up in to sit in a restaurant at my age and order a cup of coffee felt like a statement of independence and maturity for me like nothing I'd ever before felt while others all around me were ordering up their sodas.

When that cup of coffee arrived I took a sip, perhaps a bit quicker than I should have, and to this day I can remember the aroma coming from that cup, the heat of the cup on my lips and that black liquid slightly burning my tongue as I tried to look all grown up and casual like I did this all the time. (I'd only tried coffee once before and it was my folks standard Folger's made on the stove top in a percolator. Years later I'd learn that brewing coffee by that method is probably the worst way you can treat a cup of coffee.) And that's when the full taste of that cup hit and for a moment I found myself wondering why I had ever drank anything else.  There was an almost actual texture to it and I could hardly get enough of this black liquid gift from some other universe that I couldn't imagine existed.  I wanted to somehow get as much of this liquid gold as I possibly could and keep it forever.

Of course soon enough that cup and a second had been drunk and we were back on the bus for the final leg of our trip back to the little town of New Lisbon and my mom's percolator coffee. There are moments in everyone's life that awaken new possibilities and though I had no idea how it would happen I knew that one day I'd find that cup of coffee again.

And that's how the search began.

Months later I found myself driving by my old girlfriend's house in Mauston, Wisconsin when from behind a car flashed its' headlights, I pulled over and stopped to see what was going on, and a red lipped, red haired, blue eyed angel walked up to the car and asked what I was doing. A bit of conversation and I found myself following her car to a white ranch style farmhouse just outside town and into the living room and a couch.  She asked me if I'd like some coffee and I said yes and that's how I found myself watching a most peculiar for me scene unfold as she pulled out a pan, filled it with water and set it on the stove to heat.  The water boiled, she reached into a canister, pulled out a handful of coffee grounds which she promptly dropped into the pan and I watched in total amazement.

"You're making coffee?" I asked her.

"Yes," she said, "Cowboy Coffee."

The water turned darker and darker until she pulled the pan off the burner, took a glass of cold water that she poured into the brew and then poured the contents of the pot into two mugs.

I still wasn't much of a coffee drinker and I'd sure never seen it made like that so my hesitation was real but what was I to do?  I'm standing in front of this red lipped, red haired, blue eyed angel and she's just made me a cup of magic coffee.

Who's to say what effects how we experience certain things in our lives?  The moment, the surroundings, the time of day or night, the people we're with or not with will all add to or detract from the experience and how we remember it.  And when I took that first sip I was forever hooked on Cowboy Coffee and the girl that shared it with me for the very first time. In the end it would be the only time she'd ever make me coffee but I will forever remember all of it and at times wish that I could have just one more evening with her and her coffee.

Over the many years that have passed since that night there have been countless cups and mugs of coffee drunk from the streets of Athens, Greece and Nice, France to the galley of a World War Two commissioned Navy destroyer to coffee houses from Charleston, South Carolina to Phoenix, Arizona to camping trips and campfires to countless job sites but never has there been a cup of coffee that left the impression on my memory that those two cups have.

Once upon a time I decided to go on a search to try to find and duplicate those memorable cups of coffee.  I read up on how to properly brew a cup of coffee and I'd buy all different sorts of roasts and blends of coffee beans that I would grind and pour into my drip maker hoping that somehow I'd rediscover that magic.  And that's what led me to Arbuckle's coffee and a French Press coffee maker.

Now I readily admit that I'm not the most patient man in the world.  Truth be told the microwave can be too slow some days so going through the process of properly grinding the beans and then doing what you need to do with the press are not things that excite me.  When I want a cup of coffee I want it and I want it now.

But for some reason this morning was a bit different and I found myself willing to take the time and do the little bit extra to make what some will tell you is about the best cup of coffee you're going to get.  And so I took out some bottled water, poured it in a pan and turned on the heat to bring it to a boil. I took the lid of my brand new French Press coffee maker and set it all beside the stove.  I opened up a bag of Arbuckle's coffee, set the grind to a bit more coarse than what I normally use, poured some beans in the grinder and turned it on.  Water's hot so pour it in the coffee pot to heat it up then pour the water back into the pan, dump the coarse ground coffee beans in the pot and add just enough water over them to cover.  Let it all set for 30 seconds and then add the rest of the water, put the lid with the plunger on and wait a couple minutes before I push down on the strainer/plunger and now I've got it or at least I hope I do; about the best cup of coffee I could possibly make.

The aroma as I pour the straight black coffee into a cup stirs an unexpected  memory of a booth in a restaurant in Wisconsin.  I take a first taste of my latest attempt at re-finding a long ago memory and I find myself standing in the kitchen of a farmhouse just outside Mauston, Wisconsin.  And for just a moment I see a red lipped, red haired, blue eyed angel standing in front of me watching for my reaction.

I take a second sip, imagine I'm looking into those eyes from so long ago, and I smile.