On Coffee and Love, Or Coasters Should Be A Permanent Fixture For Centerpiece Tables

Coffee is a love language for my father and I. Usually it starts with him putting the kettle on, and announcing that he is making coffee. Usually in a funny voice imitating one personality, accent or another.

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I am not a morning person but I am almost always awake by 5:am because my primary way of showing love is acts of service, and I want to help prepare my little sister for school.

My father's coffee announcements are always received wholeheartedly by me, because one sip and I am alive again.

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Drinking coffee with my dad is being handed a steaming cup of black goodness that you didn't brew. Drinking coffee with my dad is being offered half of one mugful because that's the last sachet.

It's out to buy some more coffee just because my father has the most beautiful dimples and the best twinkle in his eyes when he is happy. Coffee makes him happy, and that makes me happy. g

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Two days of working overnight on my biggest project so far, absolutely sure I would receive help from my father.

A brilliant idea to wrap up the thatch in fabric and wind it around the frames of the four large baskets I was weaving. Followed by the standard cups of coffee that kept me going, and to be perfectly honest, sane.

Allowing a total stranger into your home, no questions asked because they are working alongside your stressed out child, and regaling them with tales of your numerous adventures.

Stranger now turned friend, whispers afterwards that my father has kind eyes. I agree at once, and I look at stranger now turned friend with new eyes in deep appreciation. Grateful for the reminder that I have access to that wonderful person we are agreeing on, and I can call him mine.

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Having a mind full of flashes of steaming mugs sitting on the transparent centerpiece table, without a coaster. They should have a coaster, and the consequences are wet imprints that nobody cares about, until they become obvious and then it's a big deal.

It's having those mugs in your peripheral vision, hovering around watching my father re-iron my trousers because I truly don't care if they have double lines down the front as long as they are not wrinkled. He cares though, about the tiny little details.

It is seeing the mugs on the rug as he lays watching Facebook videos.

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Catching his attention by standing in the doorway and saying, “Daddy, how do I get to Wuye/Lugbe/Suleja... from here?’, because I suck at directions, and he is a walking map of the world.

It is seeing him perk up immediately and start routing in his mind, then giving accurate directions which have never failed once. Not once.

Two mugs of coffee without coasters on the parlor table while we chat, standing or moving around. One mug is full of black coffee, and it is mine. His is creamy, but mine never is. The details are proof of love, because I am lactose intolerant and there's never any milk in my coffee.