Hunger
My mom went back to work when I was in 5th grade. We’d just moved to a new house and now we were that quintessential two-income family. Because of her early-hour shifts at the nursing home, my brother and I went at my grandfather and stepgrandmother’s house in the morning before school. We’d sleep a few extra minutes on a couch that smelled like Ben-Gay and the 1960s, have a bit of breakfast…
Oh, breakfast!
We were introduced to Wonder Bread and REAL salted butter. And it was heaven on Earth. The saltiest, fattiest, creamiest most edible substance slid over golden-brown bread, and we didn’t get it anywhere except at the grandparents’ house in the morning.
Ahhhh.
In my parents’ home, we only knew wheat sandwich bread and Country Crock. Because that’s what was affordable. Wonder Bread and real butter were for people with money. That truth was obvious early on in my life.
And now, in my own house, I’ve melded the two worlds together. It’s Kerrygold (real) butter and whole-grain bread here. Sometimes I snatch the bread just as it pops up from the toaster, my trusty butter-laden knife at the ready, so that I can watch the tiny fat globs grow smaller until they fall into the tiny, warmed toasted holes of the bread.
Because somedays, I’m 10 again and wonder if there will be cinnamon-sugar sprinkle as well.