Blog 3700 – 12.22.2025

The Pause That Refreshes

Today’s title comes from a slogan used by Coca Cola for a number of years to advertise their soft drink. In nineteen fifty-three they had a smiling cowboy with a Coke in his hand on a poster with those iconic words. My dad had a twisted sense of humor that I have inherited. In his travels in the mid-fifties as an over the road truck driver he found a print in a truck stop out west that tickled his funny bone and of course he had to bring it home, probably as much to irritate my mom as to impress his two young sons.

Teasing and irritating one another was great sport for my mom and dad, one of their great pleasures in life. I can still recall my dad putting a loud shirt or hat on and saying to me with a grin on his face, “Watch this.” He really knew how to push my mother’s buttons and get her going, but then she gave him a run for his money too. I learned all those cliches from the both of them. They dearly loved to banter back and forth. I never saw them actually dance, but figuratively this particular Texas two-step was their signature move. Fred and Ginger could not have done it better.

Though mom protested the “crudeness” of the sketch I think she found it a bit funny too. My dad’s sense of humor rubbed off on everyone after a while. My  Mom tried very hard to project a “church lady” image and example, yet I recall at least two instances where she could not help but laugh out loud at a couple of dad’s cruder jokes.

Dad thought most people pretended to manners and sensibilities that they did not truly possess and he dearly enjoyed calling out such hypocrisy anytime he saw it. What could be more natural than a cowboy, his horse, and his dog enjoying a refreshing pause on the prairie? It I s a bit humorous that all three had the same idea and at the same time. 

Like the tides the water of life flows in and out.

Your friend and fellow traveler,

David James White