This month and next month for Mother's Day I am writing about little incidents (among many) that occurred when I lived with my mother during the 2000s decade.
About fifteen years ago my 85-year-old
Mother gave me a grocery list and I went to the grocery store to get
the items, one of which was a box of graham crackers. I was surprised
that of all the cookies that are available that she would want those
specifically. She and her companion Fred always ate a sweet snack every
night at 10:00, snacks that varied from snack cakes to ice cream to
cookies but I never realized that she was so fond of graham crackers.
When I came to the cookie section, I
found that I was facing a dilemma of sorts. Should I get the more
expensive brand or go for the generic brand that contained twice as
many crackers? I also noticed that both kinds offered two choices:
honey graham and cinnamon graham. Finally, I decided on the generic
brand, figuring that a graham cracker by any other brand was still
the same and also the larger size box was half the price of the
smaller brand box. But which would Mother prefer—the honey or the
cinnamon? I finally decided that the honey was the traditional
graham cracker and Mother would prefer that one. (Please note that
this occurred before I had a cell phone so I couldn’t call her.)
So, along with my other purchases, I
left the store with a generic brand of honey graham crackers, hoping
that Mother would like them.
When I arrived home I gave her a
detailed explanation on how I had worked through my dilemma of which
graham cracker box to buy.
To which Mother replied rather
nonchalantly, “Oh, they’re for Fred and he’s not picky.”
What? I had spent all that time worrying about a treat for Fred, her Cocker Spaniel?
