Throughout my childhood, I was awakened each morning by the sound and smell of percolating coffee. After a hearty cup of Maxwell House, my father was off to feed the chickens, milk the cows or tend to the innumerable chores of a small farm.
If I beat him to the table, I watched and listened to the rhythmic gurgle and groan of the silver percolator. Boiling water repeatedly erupted into the small glass top and subsided into the ground beans held by the perforated basket below.
Hot water transformed the gritty, pleasant-smelling but inedible (yes, I tried them….once!) coffee crumbs into a black liquor that powered my father until my mother_ج
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