You know how breakfast is the most important meal of the day?
I mean do you? Do you really know this?
My mother did not eat breakfast until she was in her sixties probably.
Even now she does so for health reasons, under duress.
Breakfast is a meal she does not care about, and so
if she must consume more fiber, she will do it then.
She calls her high fiber cereal “kibble.”
I used to hate breakfast.
(and may have idolized my mother).
I did not wake up hungry, and I did not want
to wake up early enough to get hungry.
Or early enough to eat, really.
Frankly, I did not want to wake up.
And then, I got older.
And I got a job. One that keeps me busy.
Like, really quite busy.
It requires a lot of care
and close attention.
I don’t know what it would be like
if I didn’t eat breakfast.
Most days I eat oatmeal, with nuts and syrup.
Once a week I eat a croissant.
Those days, I feel hollowed out
by eleven-thirty
and if my lunch is not too substantial
I can feel off, feel tired
all day.
I know that food is fuel
but it always seemed sort of,
over the long term –
now I need to feed my body
carefully, all through the day.
Which, it turns out, I rather enjoy.