Me & My Stanley

This story isn’t about Election Day. It just starts there.

We the people had been warned to expect delays at the polls on Nov. 4. And we were offered free doughnuts and coffee to ease the pain. But to me a “free doughnut” is usually a stale doughnut, and I’ve never met a Styrofoam cup of coffee worth drinking.  The enemies of democracy this year had taken the form of long lines, old pastry and bad joe.

Duly warned, however, I went to the voting place prepared: I brought a Thermos of my own coffee. And that Stanley Thermos is what this story is really about.

My friends know that my Thermos and I are inseparable. I take it to work every day, I bring it with me on drives to the grocery store, and when I’m working in the garage it tags along. It’s like a dog.

A few years ago, my ex-wife came looking for me at work. Although we get along fine today, back then, well, let’s just say I was fortuitously away from my desk when she arrived. She asked a co-worker if I were around.

“Can’t be too far,” Joe Bob said, pointing to my Stanley. “He never goes anywhere without that thing.”

“Oh, yes, I know,” she said. “I married that Thermos.”

Sadly, the Thermos she married has passed away. It had been run over by my truck, fallen from a roof and bounced off concrete so many times that the handle had snapped and the stopper no longer stopped. I had to put it to sleep.

But an identical Stanley soon came into my life, and the one I carried on Election Day has been at my side for eight years.

I’ve not rolled any Goodyears over it or knock it from great heights, but nevertheless it has started to look like a well-worn, well-loved object. The paint is peeling, and rust is starting to flake in its nicks and crannies. But the appearance of a Thermos — like the looks of good old trucks and faithful dogs — doesn’t really matter. It’s what’s on the inside that counts. And my old Stanley still keeps the coffee hot.

But truth be told, I’ve never given its inside much thought at all.  I’ve treated my Thermos the way you’re suppose to treat your cast iron kitchen gear. It’s tempered, you see, just like a good Dutch oven. The natural patina it develops over time lends a rich, velvety smoothness to the coffee. So for eight years, other than swishing it with hot water once or twice in the morning, I’d never cleaned it.

But this fall something happened to give me pause.

I took a week’s vacation from work, but I’d neglected to empty my coffee mug before leaving. When I returned, there was a growth of something so vile in the cup I was tempted to call Homeland Security.

I scrubbed it, rinsed it, dried it, filled it, microwaved it and rinsed it again. Only then did I dare to use it.  And then a horrible vision crossed my mind: What evil might be lurking inside my Thermos?  

I determined then and there, to flush it out, to roust the nest of bacterial vermin that had unquestionably moved in and taken over the White House… Wait a minute… wrong story, sorry.

But how do I clean it?

My thoughts went directly to my grandmother. Born in the Old Country, Grandma was always polishing, scrubbing and rubbing anything she got her hands on, whether it was a copper pot, the floor or my forehead. If soap, hot water and elbow grease weren’t enough, she had two stronger cleansers in her arsenal: vinegar and bleach.

I knew bleach wasn’t a good thing to pour into a Thermos. I remember the story my father told about a guy he knew when he was a kid who drank bleach and was never quite the same. He started to mumble and drool and root for the Chicago Cubs. Truly sad.

So vinegar it would be.

I poured a little into the Thermos, agitated it, topped it with boiling water and let it sit. Hours later, I rinsed it and peered into the hole.  I could see nothing but blackness. And it smelled like vinegar. So I added soap and water and shook it like a cocktail. Then I flushed it for half an hour with hot water.  Grandma would have been proud.

The next morning, I filled it with coffee and went to work.  At midmorning, I took a sip of what tasted like hot vinegar.  

Back home I tried in vain to get rid of the taste, and no matter what I did, I could not mask the vinegar. Bacteria didn’t seem so bad at this point. Forget Grandma, I needed a hint from Heloise. Then I remembered something from grade school science: a foaming experiment involving vinegar and baking soda.

Hmmm… 

I dumped a tablespoon of baking soda into the mouth of old Stanley, filled it with hot water and let it sit. An hour later I poured out a thin oily substance that was as black as any Texas crude.

I looked down the hole and saw my eyeball looking back up from the shiny bottom. The vinegar was vanquished, and my coffee the next morning tasted as it should: like coffee. Mission accomplished.

So there it is, the story of my Stanley Thermos, which I recalled while I stood in line on Election Day, which is not what this story is about. But now that I’ve mentioned it…

The line finally dwindled and I collected my ballot. And then I cast a vote that had been in the making for eight years.

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