A Tale of a Child And Her Ravioli

I was heating up my can of ravioli for lunch today. Not the Chef, the Aldi version, and I got hit with a memory from a summer long gone.

I think I was 5 or 6 when our family vacation included a trip to Niagara Falls, NY.  Its the only time I've been to the falls. I've gone across the rainbow bridge one other time in my senior year of high school, but that summer was the only time I've seen the falls.

We were on the Canadian side, because that's really the best view of the falls, and we were going to have lunch or dinner or something. The places was absolutely beautiful. Even 40 years gone, I remember that. I knew this was a fancy special place.

We looked at the menu and I saw ravioli.

I'm a kid...so this is fabulous! Something I like that isn't a hot dog!

Then it comes.

And it isn't Chef-Boyardee.

Can you imagine how disappointed I was. It tasted nothing like what I was used to.

Needless to say, I didn't eat it, and mom and dad probably wanted to kill me because this was back in the day before microwaves were in everyone's motel rooms.

I have flashbacks even now of that day when I open a can, even though I love "real" ravioli much more these days.

Memories

A Facebook post about a Christmas children's book got me thinking of my childhood and books and forts.

Yeah forts.

When I was little, I was always building things with books. My Little Golden Books made many a castle in our living room.

Now don't worry, I still read them. In fact, I've done my best to hunt down copies of some of my more loved books. I refused to give them away to anyone, especially my Richard Scarry books. Those were always my favorite.

I didn't always build things out of books though. I remember one of the years when my mom was a Girl Scout leader and all the boxes of cookies were in the living room.

Oh yes, I arranged them into a castle.

I hated when they had to be broken down and the cookies distributed, because that castle was a great place to hide.

I wish I could build one now and hide from the world.

Those were simpler times