I cooked a turkey breast this evening, a warm up maybe, for the holidays. I made stuffing, the kind that you pourfrom the box into water boiling with butter. I made green bean casserole, my recipe was to pull the frozen plastic packet from the box and stick it in the microwave for the two minutes that the instructions said to cook it for, although this serving took four minutes to heat.

I had halfway thought that my son would be sitting down to the table with me to eat this meal, but of course, being that he is a senior in high school, he found better things to do like skateboard with his buddies and go out for pizza with a pal and his pal's mom. There is something kind of sad, when you think about it, about me sitting home alone eating this great meal that I fixed and my son keeping his friend's mom company over pizza, sharing his dazzling smile and keen wit with her, instead of me.

But that is just the way it goes at this time in the life cycle of my son and I.

His sister was here, still. She spends the weekday afternoons with me. I asked
her if she wanted a plate and she excitedly said, "Yes."

She doesn't eat meat, so I fixed her a plate with this great bread, leftover from
this great meal out that me my son and my girlfriend had the other night. Next to
the bread, I put some of my now world famous green bean casserole, yummy hot out of the microwave and plastic bag and then I scooped a hefty helping of stuffing onto her plate.

Right as I put her plate on the table, the young lady disappeared into her brother's room, where she had been watching t.v. with the dog.

The two of them, dog and twelve year old, were quite a site. Somehow, the dog was laying back on my daughter figure with his belly face up and his eggs straight in the air.

I said to her, "Do you still want this plate?"

She said, "Yes, I do, but I want to watch the end of this t.v. show."

The dog looked at me expectantly. I knew that I could count on him to eat a plate with me, even if I couldn't get the kids to.