I have a waffle story. It has some waffle ideas in it. Maybe it could be considered the nut in the middle of the bun of the thread.
(Alternately, you could consider me the nut, whichever you prefer.
)
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A Waffle-y Wedded Wife
The television screen flickered out its digitally enhanced image into the room. The girl-woman beamed a tremulous smile, eyes angling out an electrical charge, fully loaded, emotionally explosive. The boy-man’s smooth face was rigid, somber, intent, with a tiny edge of fear. In unison they lifted their eyes to the man in robes before them.
“Do you take this woman to be your loving companion in life?” the robed man intoned. His tone was rather morose, I thought. Soberly, he glanced up at the groomed to glowing perfection young couple, removing his eyes from the small notebook held in his left hand.
As the young man opened his mouth to respond, a loud insistent protest arose from my side. “Mom!” It was my fourteen-year old daughter, interrupting this moment of televised ardor that filled our living room. A sharp moue of distaste lay upon her face, much like a pattern of light and shadow pushing through a windowpane to light just momentarily – a pattern that was able to flicker in the tiniest instant imaginable to yet another one entirely different – all emotions being available and irrepressible for girls at the age of fourteen. “Why aren’t they doing it the right way?!” she demanded.
I quickly turned to look at my daughter-who-likes-to-do-things-right, and carefully yet nonchalantly responded, “What do you mean?” My “mother’s sense” was suddenly alert, ready to pounce upon questions of morality, more than ready to happily dole out the age-old lessons mothers are ready, even anxious, to pull out from silent internal files, shelved but not forgotten.
“They aren’t saying it right, Mom. They’re supposed to ask if he will take her as his waffle-y wedded wife” my daughter informed me, her voice drenched in righteous indignation.
I wanted to laugh. I responded, “That’s “lawfully” wedded they usually say. Not “waffle-y”, sweetheart.”
“Wow. Really?” she replied with a bit of awe. For this idea, one word heard the wrong way, now corrected, had now changed the world for her. It shifted it to a different shape than before. “Wow. I always thought it was ‘waffle-y’!”
Now, I’ve been a wife before. I’ve even been a lawfully wedded one. But never a waffle-y wedded one! What a notion! What would it be like, to be a waffle-y wedded wife?
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Mrs. Waffle pushed the lower half of the solid Dutch door. It made a satisfying creaking noise as she entered her bright cheerful kitchen. It was seven o’clock, a sunny morning. Mrs. Waffle always set foot into her kitchen this exact time, for she was nothing if not a very contented creature of habit. A fat brown bird with a red and blue face perched outside the kitchen window, staring into the room, cocking his head sideways first one way then the other. His impish curiosity made it seem as if the scene had been prepared for his own personal entertainment.
He lived in the apple tree set to the side of the kitchen garden, the part of the garden neatly bedded into squares. The rest of the garden looked as if Peter Rabbit and Flopsy Bunny would appear if you called for them. It was a wild and woolly garden, patches of colors intense, melding into an Impressionist blaze in late summer, complete with white picket fence, paint peeling slightly, hints of a moss green peeking from under the white glaze. The gate was just the perfect touch ajar, in a most welcoming manner.
Mrs. Waffle had not known anything at all about how it was to live as a waffle-y wedded wife before her marriage. This way of being was certainly not within the experiences of her other friends who had married. She thought of her life now, and smiled. She gazed at the lines of sun in repose striking the kitchen table, dust motes dancing along them like tiny angels searching for a pin to sit upon in the dense lemon-yellow rays.
Lemon-yellow! That reminded her of waffles.
Breakfast would soon be ready for Mr. Waffle. Millet-buckwheat-coconut waffles this morning, with a sweet dollop of lemon curd lovingly set on top just before the first bite. A bold shiny lemon was found, the zester disentangled from its dark quiet home in the kitchen drawer, and Mrs. W set to work. The spiced scent of citrus rose like a fortune of glittering delights. It filled the room, undertones of peace invoked, memories of a day spent lying on hot sand at the seashore. Mrs W’s mind wandered. Lunch - what would be for lunch?
Mr. Waffle would be traveling into the City. It was his turn today – tomorrow it would be Mrs. Waffle’s turn, for naturally they shared the balance of going forth into the world of business (just as they shared all things). Mr. W had insisted upon this early in their marriage – he’d said that was the waffle way.
Something quick and easy to eat was needed. Her long experience of Mr. Waffle’s tastes and desires within this state of waffle-y wedded bliss left Mrs. W with a sure knowledge of what to make. Two thick bacon-cornmeal waffles studded within with fresh corn kernels . . .a few slices of smoked gouda, a layer of apple butter softly wedged in between their embrace, a side of sugary-spiced pecans. That should do it.
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The day passed so surprisingly quickly, filled with its small domestic pleasures. She listened to the music from the house next door, as her neighbor Wanda Fibswapper played her new piano, various pieces, some strange, some boldly vibrating with an intended jazz rhythm. Wanda had taken up the piano late in life, and it was always good for a bit of entertaining chat in the neighborhood as to which style or piece she would be playing, today or tomorrow.
Dinner time was here, and Mrs.W readied her skillets and waffle-irons with an almost war-like dexterity. It was to be the night of rice waffles sided with a crispy fried chicken. The chicken needed to be made just right, to send out its burst of essential juices when teeth hit it, the entire dish all toppled over with cream sauce endowed with a mere hint of maple syrup, all tossed wildly together with sizzled crunchy thin bits of dense salty ham.
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How had it happened? It was dark out, yet a full moon sent a sliver of light over the top of the blinds as Mrs. W moved closer in the bed to the silent heaviness of her sleeping husband, He was solidly asleep, slightly snoring. Her eyes blinked, she started to doze, and images arose. The waffle-weave blanket that covered her somehow lifted her into the night sky. It opened, and with a little “snap!” turned itself into a magic carpet, glittering with jewel-like paisley designs. The carpet was soft, deep, warm. It flew through the star-lit sky, winging around with abandon through the air with such a flagrant sense of magnificence and utter unadulterated freedom. Then the carpet became a waffle, but no matter how hard she squinted, tossing round on it, laying flat down and even placing her face right up against the uneven surface of it, she could not quite make out what kind of waffle it was. Her husband’s own waffles, the ones he made for her, spun delicately with brilliant happy sparks like shooting stars, circling through the night air around her. Thick heart-shaped bittersweet double-chocolate waffles sensually topped with crunchy caramelized bananas. . . orange-almond-cumin waffles ladled with a rich heady creamy curried quail. . . oh! She loved his lemon thyme waffles luxurious with the fresh lobster claws holding hands on top, dotted with jewel-like aromatics in that pink vodka sauce. . . or the seven-grain waffle sandwich stuffed with Greek salad drizzled with biting tahini sauce. . .ah! There, those dreamy rosewater–peach waffles were dancing by her, twirling in the air with divine insouciance as she watched, the two round smiling matching curves of strawberry sorbet and lemon gelato glistening on top as they shimmered by in the night. So much waffle-y bliss! Mrs. Waffle slid further into dreamland with a sigh, dove deeply into dreamland, smiling in her sleep, and moving just a hint of a touch closer to Mr. W, she felt a spark. Just like water hitting a waffle iron that was ready to cook. She edged closer, ready.
