In the Early Hours of the Morning, I Sing to You, O Lord!
It's 5:20 AM and the rising bell rings giving the sisters a half hour to get dressed and ready for Lauds. Some sisters are ready in 10 minutes and are in the kitchen for a cup of coffee to wake them up and others even eat their breakfast (bread or cereal) at that time also.
Others, however, have little tasks to do that keep a house our size running smoothly! The sacristan heads out to the extern chapel to put on the lights and unlock the doors. Said sacristan is also in charge of our workmen which means setting up their coffee for their break later on.
Whoever gets to the kitchen first usually pops into the alcove and hits the button on the coffee maker. Said sacristan (Sister S) often does this as she goes past the kitchen on way to chapel if another sister who also comes down early hasn't already started it. This other sister usually heads downstairs after her coffee and bread to bring in the milk delivery and get it into walk-in (Sister B). Just before the Lauds bell rings yet ANOTHER sister (Sister M) usually pulls out the basket with the used grains out of the coffee maker as she walks by to get her hot water and tea. It all works like clock work!
I think you can probably figure out by now that sometimes things don't work as smoothly as we'd like!
Yesterday, as our way of participating in the March for Life we observe a day of fast and penance as a "Good Friday" fast, i.e. soup and bread. This morning certain nuns were obviously missing their protein because everyone was late getting downstairs. Sister B went to take the milk off the turn BEFORE her cup of coffee and Sister S was later than usual. Sister M went by the coffee machine pulling out the basket without even stopping (as she always does) and a minute later Sister S, not knowing that the basket was pulled out, trotted by and hit the button.
We'll leave it to your imagination as to the mess we had to clean up and all before any of us had had our coffee! Sister B kept whispering to Sister M, "The basket, the basket!" which made absolutely no sense to the still half asleep Sister M. Meanwhile, Sister B is saying, "Rags! Rags!" to Sister B. It took a few seconds for that to penetrate HER sleepy mind before she moved! Meanwhile, there was hot water spurting out all over the place and dripping down the counter onto the shelves!
Somehow, we got the mess all cleaned up just before Lauds. I'm sure tomorrow each one will look at that coffee maker very carefully before doing anything!