Glimpse of sun at the GossipBox Cafe

The GossipBox Caf?, on these dragged-out miserable days between winter and summer, packs the coffee crowd in at ten and two. Lets listen in on these ten oclock farmers:

Whos buying coffee?

Ifn the sun dont come out today, Im calling the auctioneer and puttin the whole shebang on the block.

No, dont do that. Call the president and tell him to fix this. Hes messed everything else up, maybe his lucks due to change.

I cant stay long. Gotta get home and grease the plow, geter ready.

You grease that one more time, itll be so slippery you wont be able to hitch it up.

At this point, someone said they thought they saw the sun come out, and everybody in there rushed over to the big picture glass window looking east. It turned out to be a false alarm. They all went back to their places, and started waving their cups for a refill. Even a false alarm was bettern nothing.

The waitress burst out of her station with a pot of coffee in each hand. She was like an Arabian race horse out of the starting gate. You had to deliver fast around here or the crowd turned ugly. Coffee addicts couldnt be trusted to behave themselves when they needed a fix.

They all waved for coffee because they were pretending this was how they did it at home, with the little woman. The waitress played along with the ruse, pretending this was how she did it at home, taking care of her hubbys every wish. Playing along. Maybe most of life boils down to playing along with it.

Most men in there knew the truth, though. Knew that if they took the waitress home, next thing you knew, the bathroom needed remodeling or something. Ah, wishful thinking. Almost as good as coffee.

All of a sudden, there was another rumor of sunshine, and the crowd once again flocked over to the window, only to once again find it a false alarm. What if it never came out until June, they all thought. Whatd we do to deserve this, they all thought.

I just read that the University said most farmers get out into the field two or three days late, said someone.

The restaurant grew as quiet as a funeral home after dark.

Someone else, whod been to junior college, said, You know, it turns out compaction and higher yield dont necessarily remain within a direct exponential relationship with one another, so thats why sometimes you want to be late.

To themselves, the older farmers thought to themselves that college was gonna be the death of farming, that if many more young folks went to college, the world would probably starve to death.

Does that mean it is, or it isnt, too early to plow?

Yup. Said one.

They were all sure it was too early. Pretty sure.

Way too early, said a voice out of the crowd.

The college guy tipped back the remains of his coffee and said, to no one in particular, Well, Im going home and try it. Then he paid and left.

Way too early, said a voice.

Too cold, said another.

He probably cant find his tractor lessn he has a computer to help him.

Ground temp-a-chers all wrong.

Suddenly, there was a stampede for the cash register. The waitress took her time. Theyd be back this afternoon. Heck, even she knew it was too early. They were just tired of coffee-cup farming, and needed a bit of the real thing. Go out to the shed, check the oil in the tractor, make sure the tires were still up on the disc, check for broken tines on the chisel plow.

Shed seen it happen every spring like this.

Besides, the slower she was now, the more likely someone would just throw a dollar bill on the table, leaving her the only tip shed likely get out of these tightwads.

What was that saying about farmers? Oh, yeah: They come to town with dirty overalls and a dollar bill, and dont change either one.

Gawd almighty, someone said, Look out there. I think the suns gettin ready to bust through.

Hurryer up up there, said a desperate voice from the rear of the line, Lord! Alls I got is a two-dollar bill.