I Had No Other Option Than Cheesecake

A Daughter and Child were with me today for lunch.  We had walked in the chilled, noon time air to an establishment I wasn’t really planning on going to.  But she wanted to try it.    I’m not particular.  Just enjoying the surprise visit and time with them.

We go in.

We sit.   We order.

I ordered a salad.  I was breaking out of my ‘grilled chicken with all the vegies you can shove on the plate’ doldrums and ordered a salad made with fruit all over it and mixed in with it.

I was quite pleased with myself.   Stepping outside of my self and being  adventurous and all.  Salad, with vegies and fruit.  Who would have thought this up?

In not too long of a wait our very large and pretty salads are brought out and waitress goes to the table about ten feet away.   Daughter gets ready to eat her salad while also prepping her Daughter’s lunch.   I have my lovely and colorful salad in front of me.  I take a bite.

I wished I had not taken a bite.

Hmmmm.   Well now.  That just did not taste right.   I told daughter who is getting ready to take her first bite that there is something wrong with my salad.   Just as we hear waitress say “we had our daughter at the hospital and she’s covered in a rash”.   Daughter stops, literally with the fork in her mouth, food just waiting there.   I look at her.  She looks at me.  She can’t make herself eat it.    As waitress goes on and says “they say she had an allergic reaction so I’m doing everything by myself while husband is home with daughter”.

Daughter takes food out of her mouth.   Whispers “should we eat it?”   I told her I can’t eat mine.  Somethings wrong with it.  I told her to taste the fruit on mine.  She doesn’t want to.  But I am The Mom and I make her.

She tastes it and says “it takes like alcohol”.   I’m not an alcohol drinker so I didn’t really have a familiarity to the taste, I just knew it was wrong.   I told her the fruit had fermented.  Her salad looked amazing (but so did mine).   Her’s didn’t have fruit.   So she tried it.  Liked it.  Decided it would be okay to eat.

Waitress comes to the table and I told her the fruit had gone bad.  She said “oh? no?  I didn’t know.”    Which was an assumption I had already made.  If she had known and served it I would have been upset.  I told her it was okay, I didn’t expect her to make my food and eat it.   She kind of smiled but I don’t think she got it.  She wanted to know if I wanted another salad. I told her no, it was okay.  Daughter and I had ordered a sandwich to split and I would just get dessert.   She gave a sad little face and walked away.

She  brought us rolls.  The plate was all wet.  She got daughter more pop to drink.

She went from table to table to kitchen to table to table to kitchen.  Non stop.

Every time she came to the table she asked if she could get us something.

At one point I asked for a piece of cheesecake.  I didn’t think it would be too much trouble.  It was already sitting in a pie counter, waiting to be served.

She got it to me.

I went to pay the bill.

It was very very cheap.

I asked her if she was sure she got Daughter’s salad.  Yes.  Both pops?  Yes.  Hotdog?  Yes.  Sandwich?  Yes.   The three cookies I purchased for them to take home?  Yes.   The cheesecake?  Yes.

I told her it didn’t seem like the bill was enough.   She said I got a discount because of where I work and pointed at my badge.

Hmmm.

Okay.  I paid and went back to the table.

I put down a tip of about 35%

I love my daughter.   She added more to the tip.

Sometimes people deserve tips for serving fermented fruit so that to fill up you have to eat cheesecake.

And they do it with a smile.

While their child is sick.