Coffee Mug & Tea Cup.

Before we compare their differences, we must first look at the similarities between our mugs of coffee & our cups of tea. We must see if they have anything in common. Not the contents, mind you, because obviously each is filled with something different, and these differences have different things to say elsewhere. But before we draw the contrasts out of the dainty teacup set against the robust mug, let us first take a minute to simmer on their similarities. Both are born the same way, forged in the fires of a furnace. After both are left to cool, all it takes is a little boiling water and each piece of porcelain remembers that warmth. In the coffee mug & the tea cup, we have a nourishing heat that we can hold, a portable hearth which we can consume. What separates them from the classical cup & bowl (for much of our history the same thing, usually a dried- gourd skin) is their handle. So warm are the contents of the coffee mug & teacup meant to be, that we had to invent a way to keep that warmth at arm’s length. The heat is held ever-present but not omnipresent; in your hands but not on your hands.

And it is in this handle that the difference lies. Not only is your average coffee bigger than your average teacup, the walls of most coffee mugs will be noticeable thicker as well. They are thus more likely to be warm, rather than unbearably hot. If you wish to warm your hand on a coffee mug, you can simply curl your fingers around the curved side. Indeed, many soup companies have banked their identity on the image of a warm mug of soup with both hands cupped around its circumference. True, you can rest the fingers of your other hand (but not so much your palm) on the edge of a teacup. In polite society, doing so even gave an observer of etiquette something to do with an otherwise cumbersome hand. Even then, the fingers of the free hand would likely be resting above the waterline so-to-speak, lest the daintiness of the fine porcelain china not be enough to insulate the contents. Carried with this was the implication that the tea drinker’s alabaster fingers were similarly dainty. Today, our free hand is likely to be waving itself around the conversation, emphasizing whatever story we are sharing with a friend over a cuppa. But it is still the decorative daintiness of the teacup that sets it apart from the coffee mug. That, and the fact that a cup of tea typically comes in some kind of set, either a whole tray with teapot & sugarbowl etc, or at the very least a saucer. Many cafes have started serving cups of tea with the bag still in, so one may take it out & leave it on the saucer once their desired strength of flavor is reached. But we should remember that while this recent habit somewhat justifies the saucer’s presence, the saucer has been there as long as the proper teacup has been.

There is another difference between teacups & coffee mugs, or should we say a second consequence of their difference in sturdiness. Teacups will eventually chip or crack, thereby forcing you to throw them out because their use as a decorative item is now tarnished. But coffee mugs are more utilitarian: though the logo or slogan printed on them may fade or peel, the mug itself neither chips nor cracks, and is kept until the inevitable distant day that it smashes to smithereens. Their shape speaks their purpose. The teacup is round, hemispherical: it represents the ideal well-rounded, complete conversation we hope takes place over & above its rim. The coffee mug is cylindrical with a high centre of gravity; it stands just as strong & sturdy whether or not it is has anything in it. The coffee mug is entirely utilitarian, except for whatever smart-arse comment is printed on it. It is entirely understandable, infact increasingly commonplace, to have a coffee with oneself while you work. Most would go as far as to say that coffee helps them work, and they couldn’t get through a day without one there. But we take a tea-break.

Urban legend says that we ‘clink’ glasses during a toast because in earlier times one’s enemies were often offed with a goblet of toxic wine. To combat this suspicion, the host is said to have raised their own glass first, thereby inviting their guest to tip a sip’s worth of their potentially poisonous brew back into their own cup. Of course, if the guest was any kind of guest at all, they would refute this suspicion by raising their own glass but carefully clash its rim against that of their fellow without spilling a drop from one drink into that of the other.  Needless to say, if the host was even remotely hospitable, this trust would be in good taste and both would live to drink another day. Urban legend says a lot of things, but common sense remembers that if these rumours were true, this specific practice of poisoning would not have been effective long enough to become commonplace. People simply would have become aware of the tradition as a way of administering poison (and thus found an alternative) long before it was ingrained as part of the traditional toast. More to the point, the legend implies that there is an inherent mistrust inside all of us, and that such a suspicion is only natural. Even folk histories have a metaphorical truth to them, however. The myth that meetings between two people were once so laded with murder & mistrust as to develop signals that both acknowledge & defused them, it makes it all the more merry when we imagine the festivities a larger party. When we imagine an ancient Viking beer hall (or most English pubs if their local team has just won) we see a crowd of cheering men arm-in-arm, drinks in hand, swaying back & forth. Chanting too loud to hear the clinking of their cups, the glasses nevertheless clash against each other, their contents spilling everywhere: over each & every person, across the floor and indeed, into each other. And that happens the same whether it is a glass or cup, or the more mug-like Beer stein. Cheers to that.

/mr_metaphor.