When my kids were both still living at home with me full time, which wasn’t all that long ago, I remember visiting one of my single girl friends at her home. She poured water from a glass pitcher filled with ice and bright yellow slices of lemon into wine glasses. She then pulled out a loaf of french bread, proceeded to slice it into small thick pieces, poured a bit of extra virgin olive oil onto a small plate and sprinkled it with herbs. As we sat drinking our fancy ice water and eating our trendy Italian inspired snack, I thought how cosmopolitan she was. The conversation flowed as easily as the ice water and I walked away thinking how hip my friend was with her entertaining that day.
Today, as I sliced thick slices of pumpernickel bread from a bakery loaf and spread it with light cream cheese, olive and pimento spread I suddenly realized the truth. It wasn’t that my friend had an elaborate pantry filled with all the trendy and hip items. My friend was living on a meager budget, although at the time I never would have guessed. How do I know this now?
Easy, as I returned the unsliced portion of my bakery loaf of pumpernickel to it’s bag, the bright yellow sticker on the bag caught my attention. It declared to the world that I’d gotten the tasty bread from the silver rack at Super Wal-mart for .75 cents. And that cream cheese and olive spread that could have come straight from a Food Network episode on what to serve at a tea party is really just a good cheap way to make the cream cheese go further for lunches and bagels (also gotten on the clearance rack).
The picture I held in my head of a single girl’s pantry being filled with all the fancy ingredients that Giada, Rachel and Bobby have in the Food Network kitchens disappeared to be replaced by bakery bread bags with bright yellow stickers. It wasn’t my friends pantry that had made our time together feel important and trendy, it was the way my friend presented it. She treated it as if it was a delicacy, and in turn it made me feel special that she was sharing it with me. And now that I’ve uncovered the truth?
As I sliced my sandwich into neat triangles, I hoped that if I were to serve my pumpernickel cream cheese delights and raspberry iced tea that my guests would walk away feeling as special as I had on that day I’d been served french bread, dipping oil and lemon flavored ice water.
