I like my coffee in a mug. Coffee demands a large cup that you can hold with more than one finger. That being said, I seem to have overdone a good thing. While cleaning the kitchen, I realized that I had accumulated more mugs than my shelf could hold.

Why would anyone need so many mugs? After all, you can only drink out of one at a time.

Looking over the mugs, I realized it was not a collection at all, but more of a miscellaneous hodgepodge of cups, most of which had materialized in my cabinet without me noticing.

I have a couple of mugs that have advertisements on them. There is one with a dot.com ad on it that could probably be disposed of, but I haven’t. There is one from Gateway that came with a computer I bought years ago. The cup outlasted the computer, which long ago became an electronic dinosaur. 

There are souvenir cups that came from conferences, one that says “Columnists do it write” and a couple of navy mugs that say, “I secretly like Nancy Grace.” I’ve not been able to bring myself to drink from the cup of Nancy Grace, so those just sit on the shelf. 

There are souvenir cups from other people’s vacations, like the one that says Bahamas. I don’t know why I need cups to remember other people’s vacations. There is even a cup that says Nashville on it. Why would I have a souvenir of my home city?

I have cups that were gifts, like the one that says “Well done.” I don’t remember what was well done, but I have the cup to remind me that I once did something well.

A few of the cups were gifts to someone else, like the one that says “Dad” and has a picture of my granddaughter. There is a tall mug that says “Coffee”. It probably came packaged with a gourmet beverage inside.  I don’t like it because it has the one finger style handle.

Some cups are seasonal and celebrate a holiday like Halloween or Christmas. I have a a scarecrow mug, and several for Christmas. Of course, those can only be used at the right time of the year, preferably with flavored beverages.

Some of the mugs I actually purchased, for instance, those two, red, Angry Birds cups. I bought them for gifts and then decided they were too stupid to give to anyone, so they ended up in my cabinet.

One pretty mug with a large blue heart is the lone survivor of a matching set of four. I remember how angry I was at a friend who borrowed a mug from my new set and never returned it. I can’t use that mug as it makes me mad all over again.

Another mug is too faded to read but was purchased at the Corvette Museum and said “Get your kicks on Rt. 66.” Actually, there once were two of those. I don’t know what happened to the other. It apparently had enough kicks and faded into oblivion.

One extra large mug has an ad for 1887 tobacco. I have no earthly idea where it came from or why I have it.  I’m not sure what 1887 tobacco is for – smoking, chewing, dipping or sniffing. The cup could be for spitting for all I know.

My favorite mugs ever were stoneware with a Pennsylvania Dutch design. I hated it when the last one broke. I tried to find more, but never could.

There are mugs with flowers and mugs with teddy bears. I don’t know why I don’t throw away this ridiculous assortment and buy a set of pretty matching mugs. But, they are like old friends; each has a personality and a story. They are mugs with character.

A new set would soon be broken and miscellaneous cups would creep in unnoticed to fill the empty spaces. I might as well keep the ones I have.

Copyright 2012 Sheila Moss