Breakfast for Dinner

I took a break and went to see my best friend in the beautiful city of Boise, Idaho. It never gets old to see a true season of colorful autumn hues, throw on a warm jacket and hat, breathe in the cool crisp air, chat away with someone that loves you for who you are and eat good solid food.

I will remember my parting view, looking out the window of my friend’s home, the deer taking a break on the damp, cold grass. Lying down curled up like cats, basking in the light coming through the parting clouds, content to rest in a place that felt like home.

Whenever we get the opportunity or blessing to casually travel we normally head home refreshed with a new sense of being. That’s exactly how I felt and then I hit the ground running. Upon return, the dogs were excited to see me, one of them had been quite naughty when I was gone, the house was floating with fur from the other one, bills piled up, the frig was so so, enough to keep us going a day or two, and the news both personally and nationally was very stressful. Welcome home!

As I was rifling through the frig to figure out dinner I saw a pack of chicken apple sausages, eggs, frozen hashbrown patties and bagels that hadn’t expired. Smiling, I felt a sense of peace. Peace, because it gave me the instant memory of children cheering a mom with zero dinner ideas announcing we would be eating “breakfast for dinner!” “Yay!” “Can we have orange juice too?” I turned on the tea kettle, pulled out the butter and jam, set the counter space we sit on for dinner and lit a cinnamon scented candle. My husband walked in from work and I said “I think we’ll have breakfast for dinner.” He said, “that sounds great!”

How is it that a simple meal, the start of a new day, often skipped, with the most basic ingredients, can bring us such comfort? I’d say it’s an instant image of gratitude. Gratitude for the moments in time that have bonded us to each other even if just for a few minutes. You cannot count, compare or measure this sacred time.

As the season turns cooler, with a renewed sense of writing about “home” and what a home means, I press forward, drawing close to the comforts of home. What we hold dear, a warm shelter, with basic food in the frig, which bypasses all perfectly planned perfection and evokes the simplest of memories we cling to as we age.

Yes, a home is far more than the design and decor. It is the process, the contemplation of the treasured dream, the feeling of a home or the people who lived there. It is a space where a joke was shared, love was declared, an argument made, a knee scarred, a beloved pet lived, tears shed, joy held time, a tree stood, that kept the secrets of children at play and history made like the simple fellowship of breakfast for dinner.

I’ll be back..