WHAT HAPPENED TO THE SAUCER?

As I was having my second cup of coffee, I wondered whatever happened to the saucer? It used to be that if you had a cup of coffee it was served on a saucer. And we don't really use a cup any more -- it is more like a mug.

If you go out to eat and order coffee, it comes in this "cup" that looks more like a little mug. I mean, I don't mind. . . it holds more than a cup, more like a cup and a half. But, as a child, I remember adults having coffee and it was served on a saucer. It seemed sorta classy. And it kept the coffee confined to the saucer if you slopped a bit out of the cup. Plus, it was a place to put a spoon if you like cream or sugar in your coffee.

I remember a grandfather, from my Dad's second marriage, who had coffee with every meal. He would pour some of his coffee into the saucer and let it cool a bit before he would drink it from the saucer. It didn't seem like bad manners. It was just something he did, like eating peas from his knife. There was always a saucer for coffee and hot tea.

If you went out anywhere to eat and ordered coffee, you got your coffee in a cup with a saucer. It was easier to carry. No burnt fingers. My sister has about a million teacups with saucers. They all are pretty and dainty, and she never ever uses them. They just set in a display case. Some are worth money. But the everyday cup and saucer? We hardly see them at all these days.

Maybe it's because of when we started to see flying saucers. They decided to do away with the cup and saucer and just have this mug thing instead. I have a few of my great grandmother's cups with saucers. They, too, set in a cupboard. I get them out every now and then. Maybe for a cup of hot chocolate on a wintery night. Or for a cup of real percolated coffee, and I think back to when families still sat around a table to eat, drink, converse, and be a real family.

I've found a place to eat that serves your coffee cup on a saucer. The cup is a little over sized, like a mug. It's good coffee. And the food is like moms used to make, when we were kids. I can close my eyes, smell the coffee, listen to the voices around me, and the tinkle of the spoon against a cup, and I am transported back to my childhood to a time that brings memories of family setting at the kitchen table, laughing, talking, and drinking their coffee. I hear the sound of a cup being placed back on it's saucer, and the room smelling of fresh perked coffee.

Maybe it's time to bring back the cup and saucer!