“A Look At the Colonial World Through the Eyes of….”

             I am a tavern owner. My name is James Smith and today was the day. General George Washington was coming to town. I wake up hearing my wife Primrose screaming at our slaves and ordering them to do chores. I ask my wife “Is all this really necessary?” She replied “We might be serving the General if he were to have a good time in our own tavern, we could end up being the best tavern in town”. “General George!” I burst out. She nods. Approximately one minute later I started screaming orders as loud as I could. In the garden “Make sure everything is ripe and ready!” I start going to their kitchen and yell, “Carefully prepare a meal that the general will die for!”.

                       I hear a knock at the down. My stomach knots up into a pretzel, I thought the General wasn’t coming till  tonight. I open the door with the biggest fake smile and…. oh. Its just the Cooper’s apprentice Stephen with  two barrels of cider and one little basket of the finest tobacco in town. I have the waiters collect them and I give Stephen a generous tip. I take a break of being the meanest boss alive as I spot my children playing cards in the  living room. I walk over and see them playing Go Fish, that’s my favorite card game. I have two children a boy and a girl. The Boy’s name is James  jr. and my daughters name is August. I am blessed that they are very close with each other and they don’t argue to much. We play at least 25 games of cards. I do the classic dad move and let each of my children will every game.

        I hear horses. I run out the door and see a carriage from far. George and his wife Martha on on there way. I go to our private dining room and prepare a delightful table from the couple. The table lies the first course meal, one candle wick and drinking menu’s on the side. My wife is welcoming the other customers in the main dining room. I call out Primrose and my two children and we stand at the door waving to the man that could change our taverns image. He walks up our orange stairs and shakes my hand saying “how do you do”? In those few words I was stunned his wooden rotten teeth were disgusting.

A man with much money as George Washington should be able to buy class. I smile and tell him what an honor it is. As they  walks through the door I have all my waiters stand in a line guiding the Washington’s to their table. Hopefully they will enjoy the meal. I do my daily routine and go around to the main dining room saying hi to all the family’s. It’s a full house tonight. I go to the private dining room and see Jonathan one of my waiters. He seemed shocked. I ask “what’s wrong?” he replies. “Nothing it’s that both the Washington’s want Hot Cider out of all drinking choices”. I smile because I had a feeling  I would need extra cider barrels.