Dad always took a coffee break around ten o'clock in the morning and then again mid-afternoon. He had the shop, and would leave a little note on the door that he'd be back. A lot of times when I was able to go, or was already with him, he took me along. Of course this was a bunch of men his age he'd drink coffee with. (Except one gentleman always drank hot tea.) When I was younger, Dad and I would walk in the café or restaurant or donut shop or wherever we were having coffee at the time, and they'd all make comments such as, "Uh oh, we'll have to watch our language now!" That didn't bother me, I knew where they were coming from, probably just teasing, but who knows, maybe if I wasn't there they might've brought up some dumb joke or something I didn't need to hear! As it was, they all just had good conversation about this and that as they sipped their coffee, and I enjoyed just sitting and listening. Usually I had hot cocoa or something. I enjoyed coffee breaks with Dad every so often even after I was married. Then after we had our boys, they would come along, too.
Dad enjoying some coffee in the "C-Plus."
Mom also had coffee breaks as part of her day all through her working years. After graduating from business college and then working in an office in another town for a year or two, she moved to our hometown after her folks had bought a farm and moved there a few months earlier. She worked in the AAA (agriculture) office, and also met my dad and they got married after a few months. After that, through the rest of her life (except when my brother and I were born and weren't in school yet) she worked in the courthouse. For several years she worked in the treasurer's office, then after brother and I were in school, she worked in the county clerk's office as Deputy County Clerk until she retired.
Our hometown courthouse, July 2011.
Mom (left) and her boss in their office during their retirement reception.
During my young adult years, I had several opportunities to work on different temporary jobs in a few of the offices in the courthouse, including the office Mom worked in. I'd say most if not all of the work in these offices is very painstaking and mentally taxing, with record-keeping, finances, LEDGERS (an inside joke), correspondence, and what-all. So naturally, a break mid-morning and mid-afternoon was welcome. At first, the coffee room for all the ladies on that floor was a little, tiny "room" behind another conference room, that sort of connected the treasurer's office and the county clerk's office. The sun would stream in the east windows in the morning, and we'd all crowd in to sit a bit and maybe sip coffee or whatever. (I remember getting a big glass bottle of pop from the pop machine for ten cents, and there were wooden bottle crates stacked to the side of the machine to put your empties in!) There's definitely a difference between what men talk about and what women talk about! The breaks were pretty strict to be only fifteen minutes, then we'd all go back to whatever we were doing in the offices. Later, a larger room in front of the ladies' room was furnished and decorated for a better and roomier break room.
But here's the funny part that I remembered as I sat at work this morning.
Invariably, sometimes people would come to do business there at the courthouse mid-morning or mid-afternoon, and find everyone in the break room. Well, some people got the notion that that's where all the office ladies spent their time ... in the break room ... because that's where they always saw them! But I can vouch for the fifteen minute limit!
I'm a firm believer that if you're doing work any time of day, that if you get a little tired of it, or worn down, TAKE A BREAK. Even just a little bit will revive and refresh you to continue on.
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