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The Meal

Being a Friday during Lent, those who practice the Catholic faith are supposed to abstain from meat. To me, this is no hardship what-so-ever... I probably average 3-4 days a week where I do not have meat with any of my meals (I am not overly fond of meat... and most of the meat I do eat is turkey or chicken). My wife and her side of the family, however, are of a heritage where *any* meal without meat is incomplete at best. My wife, having lived with me for so long, no longer feels so compelled to eat meat every meal, but being a Friday during Lent, she will often crave eating a fish dinner.

The favorite within her family is from a fish fry that is produced every Friday by a local Gun Club (a Field & Stream sort of group). Normally, I would encourage my wife to go and I and my mother would eat something together.

With my mother no longer here to eat with, I decided to go with my wife to her parents home and eat the "fish fry". Unfortunately, fish is really not a food I particularly enjoy, and also I am not fond of fried foods either. However, I did desire company and companionship and so I went with her.

It was a nice time. The Gun Club (surprisingly) had baked fish as well (I can tolerate that far better). The meals were all take-out, but when we picked them up I asked for a special request for mine... my meal contained all the normal fixings... baked potato, cole slaw, macaroni & cheese... but in my case, I ASKED for ONLY TWO small pieces of BAKED fish (each piece roughly 2 inches x 2 inches). This differed from the others that would average a pound or more of batter fried fish in each normal take-out order. If I had purchased a normal meal and received it with so much fried fish, I would not have been able to coax myself to eat anything. Therefore, the box I had may have been not as good a deal for the money, but I was able to eat what I was given in my order (after layering a thick layer of tarter sauce over the fish). It was enjoyable.

So, it was a nice evening.

When we arrived home, my wife commented that we forgot to leave any lights on in the house. This statement caused in me a wave of guilt and sadness.... I immediately felt ashamed I had not left the lights on appropriately through the house for Mom, and I was saddened thinking that Mom might be feeling afraid in the darkened house.

Then, of course, I remembered the reality that my Mother was actually NOT in the house. So, I got a sort of one-two punch to the gut.... 1) I felt horrible because I had not made the house comfortable and safe for my Mother by having the lights on appropriately and that might lead her to be scared, and 2) the remembrance of her passing after having had it go out of my mind for a few moments while at my wife's parent's home.

It is interesting how things like this seem to occur. I still feel a bit weak in the knees from it. I am heading off to bed now to try to sleep myself into a better mood for in the morning.

PipeTobacco