After M and I–joined for part of the time by my brother Z–sang our portion of the coffee shop gig we shared with another duo, we sat around listening to our friends sing as I drank my complimentary cappuccino that tasted like regular old coffee.
My nephew J and niece R, two of the best front-row audience members in these parts, had watched us sing from two armchairs we’d scooted off the stage, and had even given us a note during the performance to request a song (which we sang but only with much stumbling about, since I couldn’t remember how to play the guitar part).
As we sat around the table, J recycled the note paper, this time addressing it to Z: “Dear rich uncle. I am hungry. J.”
I should note that my sister and her husband have been on a spending freeze in recent weeks, and intent on not spending any money on anything unnecessary, and so the kids knew full well the futility of begging them for any of the delightful treats on display in the coffee shop.
So what could my brother do? He handed J his credit card, and he and R headed off to buy two chocolate chip scones, one for them and one for the rest of us to share.
The communal delight was overshadowed only by my sister’s elevated sense of glee when finally, a bit later, her husband broke their spending freeze and bought a strawberry smoothie to share with the kids.
“Now I can buy the cream cheese to use in this recipe,” she said as she finished copying it by hand from one of the shop’s magazines. “And go clothes shopping!”
“I can’t go into a place and not buy something,” my brother-in-law said. “It doesn’t seem right.”
And it’s not nearly so tasty, either.
