Sweet Things
Maybe it’s because each year is accelerating faster and faster than the year before, but 2015 Easter blew in out of nowhere. Suddenly: advertisements for Easter egg hunts on every block, including a slip in Puck’s homework folder for Saturday morning. So we went to school on a Saturday.
Violet saw us shortly after the mad dash of vacuuming the front lawn for hundreds of plastic pastel eggs. Considering that she and Puck have “crushes” on each other – at seven, almost eight – it was funny watching them interact, Puck playing it totally cool from start to finish, Violet admiring the variety of goofy faces plastered on the particular stash of eggs he had selected from the grounds.
On the ride home, Puck examined his basket of chocolates.
“I’m gonna make my special recipe when we get home, Mom. You put milk in a cup with honey and then I will put chocolate in it, like this chocolate carrot. And then microwave it for four minutes. You will love it.”
I’m not a big fan of hot drinks on any level, but I had to freely admit about an hour later, that the kid knew how to compose a good mug of hot chocolate.
It was an unconventional Saturday. Second Grade Parents’ Dessert Meet-And-Greet in Town & Country. Rolling green hills of stone-and-brick mansions, groomed lawns and gardens, tables spread with French bakery pies and macaroons.
Anyway, it wasn’t only millionaires mingling over wine and cheese boards that evening. There was also pecan pie for the likes of “simple people” like us. Well, I don’t eat pecans, but whatever. Nice people all around. We ended the evening talking with Violet’s mom, the art teacher, husband to Puck’s teacher, for about half an hour at a round table in the corner, swapping information about each other.
“So you read all the time. What do you read? Do you read any of those silly romantic things?”
“Well, I’ve been reading about Ulysses S. Grant…”
“Oh. What? You like that stuff? I mean, no that’s good! That’s good! But, not like, ‘The Devil Wears Prada’ or something? No, really, I’m deep!”
So as the evening concluded I left with a hug from the art teacher and a chocolate layer cake “thank you” candle at the door.