Dads Army mug

02 February 2014

Here’s one of my favourite Christmas presents from 2013. On the face of it just an enamelled mug, but to me it’s much, much more than that. There’s a massive amount of symbolism going on here. Drinking from it in the comfort of my comfy armchair and surrounded by the comfort of our modern age I can nevertheless imagine myself transported back it time to…

(insert wavy transition sequence here)

I’m a young recruit to the WWII Home Guard, green around the gills, no clue what’s going on, my ability to take orders my only saving grace… and someone gives me a mug of tea.

Ok, ok, I’m ordered to make the tea but that’s a trifling detail - isn’t this my story‽

Tinny pressed mug; flimsy pressed spoon; muddy water on a rolling boil in a patterned, enamelled container of origin best-not elaborated on. The milk’s a bit lumpy but that’s ok, it goes in, the tea’s good; any refuge from this biting cold is welcome…

(a-aaaand back to the future)

It makes a satisfying tinny sound when stirring tea (with bags, 3-1/2 sugars, thanks!) - it’s reassuringly light, it harks back to a bygone era when a man used what he was given - and liked it.

And it’s already taken on a manly patina. Oh, yes.