Growing Up In the Middle

4

Dad was gone to work before we got up, and my mom...well, let’s just say she could not face three little boys in the a.m. so we were pretty much on our own for breakfast. We all came home for lunch (a rule enforced throughout our school years) as Dad believed we should have meals together as a “loving” family. Breakfast never counted. Maybe this is why right to this day I often forget to pray before breakfast, we never considered it a meal. We always ate, don’t get me wrong, we were not one of those families who forgets to eat a meal; we just never gave breakfast the official meal status.

I shouldn’t put quotation marks around “loving” in the last paragraph, as it gives the vibe that we did not actually love one another. Let me explain why they are there: I “quotated” the loving part because we were supposed to love one another – by force if necessary (as will be evident in later chapters – wait for mouth to mouth kisses between boys). Dad ruled that we loved each other and would eat together even if he had to beat us until we would not sit down for a week! Sound good? That is why I thought I would put quotes on “loving” family. I got sidetracked, oh right – breakfast.

At a young age, I am going to say I was seven, Duane nine, Darren five or six, we discovered that our favorite times were unsupervised meal times – like breakfast. There were walls on three sides of the table, and all were white. Milk is white as well, so you can fill your spoon with milk from your cereal bowl, and fling it across the table at your brother and any that misses disappears on the wall. A perfect crime: victimless except for the one across the table from you.

What were we thnking?? Of course Mom was going to notice that we had been flinging milk at each other, the walls were dripping with it, and the floor and rug under the table were soaked in it. I am confident that we smelled like stale milk at school, and before long Mom discovered the true source of this horrendous mess. I can’t remember exactly which words she chose to explain to us the consequences of doing this again, but I know that our lives were at stake, and we got her message loud and clear. Sometimes Mom would use the “wait until your father gets home” routine – and that scared the crap out of all of us. Other times she turned from the loving matriarch that we all adored into a deadly serious disciplinarian that we knew to take seriously. When mom got mad – we listened, no sass, no blinking – just obey and take your licks. Another thing to remember was to blend in with the other two boys. No matter what happens, when mom was yelling you did not want to cough, laugh, or move in any way. Do not draw her eye from the group to you as an individual – this was suicide! Like I said, we stopped flinging milk right away.

Again, at breakfast, the number three presents problems. Two sides to the table (ends were off-limits as these were our parents “chairs”) and three children. Who sits down first? Here is the problem…Duane and Darren want to sit beside each other. This allows two-on-one for the eventual milk flinging, as well as close communication for making up gross nicknames, and songs that are defamatory in nature to the one sitting on the other side. If I sit down first, the other side is wide open for the two of them. If Duane sits down first I could sit beside him, but he is bigger and will certainly hit me. If Darren is silly enough to sit down first, I sit beside him and the war ends before it starts – no fun for anyone, but better for me as it gives a painless start to the day. The trick is to pour cereal and have milk in hand when Darren and Duane get their cereal selected. Once Darren’s cereal is in the bowl, pour his milk for him, then mine in my bowl, then put the milk in the fridge - delaying Duane for long enough to get our seats. This is a tricky process, since no one likes soggy cereal and if I pour my own milk too soon I run the risk of having to go sit down and eat – an unacceptable option..

Of course there is always the possibility that I could move after I have started eating, but this poses it’s own risks as the others follow suit and move while they are eating leaving me without a chance for a win. In addition, you may spill milk and then you have mom to deal with. Whoever said don’t cry over spilled milk was an i***t!

Another problem with breakfast cereal is that at least once a week, the sight of cereal, milk and sugar in a bowl will loosen the bowels to a degree that is not ignorable. This is not just my problem, it would happen to one of us at some point in the week, and without fail you would be sitting on the toilet when you realized that you left your cereal unguarded in the kitchen (you just don’t have time to think of this any earlier). It may look like your breakfast when you get back, and you may even be stupid enough to take a taste of it, but I guarantee that the two other boys have done something horrible and made your breakfast fit only for the trash.

Cloves… yep, had that in my cornflakes. Poppy seeds in my Rice Krispies were not bad, but not good either. Salt, Pepper, green onions, syrup, molasses. Pretty much anything that can be grabbed from the pantry and hidden in a bowl of cereal, has been done to death. I started getting smart with my colon, and would get everything out on the counter – bowl, spoon, cereal box, sugar, and milk. This would trick my lower intestine into thinking that the milk has started to sog my breakfast, and it would release it’s grip on … well, let’s just say I would get an urge to leave. I could leave the kitchen and relax knowing that nothing bad can happen to my breakfast from nature - or from my brothers.

The first time I tried this, my loving brothers made my breakfast for me, so when I got back to the kitchen I had a complete bowl of cereal waiting for me. What a nice gesture, I thought – they must really care and love me. They are always being so nice to me that this is not the slightest bit conspicuous. The little morons were far too obvious, and I never found out what the “treat” was in that one. It went into the sink and I started fresh. It turns out that outwitting my brothers was easier that outwitting my own digestive tract.

A special treat for breakfast would follow mom’s bread baking day. If it was bread, then we would have fresh home-made bread sliced really thick with butter and corn syrup on it. Wow! Mom’s loaf was big, and as a child, the piece of bread was as big as our head, I should know. One morning, unsupervised as always, we had fresh bread and I was just taking my first bite from my piece. “Where is the ever-important first bite taken?” you may wonder. The bottom of the piece, right in the middle. Why? Only one crust, unlike the corners, and the maximum amount of syrup possible in one bite. Wow, what a taste! Suddenly, from across the table sprang Duane into action. Like a lion on a lame zebra, he darted and pushed my bread flat to my face.

I was in shock. Syrup filled every hole on my face and the bread fell apart as I pulled it free from my pores. My eyes were stuck shut, but I could clearly hear the two of them laughing at me. Yes, the bread was as big as my head. I stumbled to the bathroom and pried my eyes open while splashing warm water on my face. My brothers came to the bathroom door to laugh at me some more while I washed every nook and cranny, and my hair as well!

Sometimes fresh bread meant fresh cinnamon buns. If you think these three little boys were monsters for Mom’s bread, you should have seen us when the cinnamon buns were out. These buns were a fair size and full of the stuff we loved…sugar! Even today it is hard for me to believe that Mom had to limit us to three buns a piece for breakfast. She felt this was necessary after we devoured an entire batch before going to school one morning. I can only imagine what went through her mind as she got up to find her kitchen devoid of the previous day’s baking, and down a half a pound of butter. “THREE!” She told us, “no more!”

This new wrinkle in our lives made things slightly more complicated. Now we had to race to the kitchen and make sure we got the three biggest cinnamon buns before anyone else did. The only consolation I found was that when it came to cinnamon buns, there was absolutely no messing around. There was no favorites between us, we all fend for ourselves and hated each other equally. The other two boys were hungry dogs that would try and stake claim to our buns, and there was no time to make friends when there were cinnamon buns to be had.

Cinnamon buns were sacred in our house. Once they were on your plate – which means you touched them and buttered them the way you liked – nobody would do anything to them. You could run to the kitchen, elbow Darren in the face, grab the three biggest buns you could find, step on Duane’s foot to get to the butter while he compared the sizes of two remaining buns to get the largest. Butter the bun, set it on the table, and you are done! Whew! What an ordeal, but it was worth it, I got the buns I wanted, or two good ones anyway. The third is small, but still the largest in the bag – not a stumpy end one. Now I could do detail things like pour a glass of milk, go to the bathroom, and even put pants on.

The next day we would do it all again, and the rejected buns from Thursday would be Friday’s big prize. I am pretty sure that germs from Thursday fingers can’t live on something sweet and sticky for twenty-four hours, what my brothers grubby hands mauled the day before would be on my plate and covered in a thick layer of butter in no time at all.

MMMMMM……Butter. With options like sticky buns, syrup-drenched bread, sugar-coated cereals, and anything covered in butter – is it any wonder that breakfast is my favorite meal of the day?? Add to that the “no adult supervision” feature, and breakfast makes the top-three favorite times in my entire life. The only bad thing about breakfast was that it meant we were going to school next, and there is little I can say about school that is good.