Raisin Bran

"This cereal is good stuff," Pop says as he taps the box of raisin bran. It is sometime between 8 & 8:30 AM and he is ready for breakfast. He moseys over to the spice cupboard, "No bowls in there," he thinks to himself. He moseys over to the condiments cupboard, "No bowls in there either I see." He tries the cupboard where we keep the drinking glasses. Realizing he is having difficulty, again, finding the cereal bowls I direct him across the room to the appropriate cabinet.

With cereal bowl located he begins opening up drawers looking for a spoon. He opens the towel drawer first because it is on the island right in front of him. "Let's go with the most obvious," I assume he is thinking. No spoons in there so he pulls the next drawer only to find plastic wrap, bags and such. I direct him to the drawer behind him by the sink to locate the spoons.

"Milk" ... he starts toward the pantry, corrects himself and moves to the big black refrigerator. "Ah, ha!" Once the milk is on the island he says, "Jude, where's the sugar?" Sugar bowl being where it always is, sitting on top of the island, I point at it.

Once all the essentials are located he proceeds to pour ever so little of the raisin bran into the bowl. He moves the cereal around with his fore finger gauging if he has poured too much. As you recall from one of my previous blogs, Pop likes life in small portions. After determining if there is an adequately small portion in the bowl he sugars it, pours his milk and the feast begins. After eating he goes to the sink, rinses the bowl and puts it in the draining rack. I go to the draining rack and retrieve the bowl and spoon and put them into the dishwasher.

In about 5 minutes Pop goes to the cereal bowl cupboard (he got it right this time) and pulls out another bowl. Having determined that he had not eaten enough the first time around he opens the box of raisin bran and pours another small portion of cereal, fingers it, sugars it and proceeds to eat the second bowl. He looks at me and says, "Man this is good stuff."

Later that evening, around 8 p.m. Pop makes his way into the kitchen, pulls the box of raisin bran from the pantry. "Why bother with a bowl," he thinks to himself. He begins to eat it right from the box, no milk, no sugar leaving his trail of raisin bran all over the kitchen counter tops and dribbles all over the floor.

I think to myself, "what good would it do to clean it up tonight? It will just be spilled all over again tomorrow." I leave the room with Pop standing at the kitchen counter grazing on raisin bran as he thinks to himself, "Man this raisin bran is good stuff."