The Critical Mom's Meals Today

I just could not face healthy food today. At 6:15 a.m, the empty calories in my supermarket bread tasted just fine with coffee strong enough to walk on. At lunchtime, I thought I'd be more interested in the ham and lettuce sandwiches in the cafeteria. That brown bread, those tomato sandwiches. How about a tomato sandwich, Harriet the Spy's favorite lunch? I remember gobbling those when I was twelve--with Hellmann's mayonnaise, salt, dill, on Pepperidge Farm white bread. I had the usual theory: if I eat like Harriet and spy like Harriet, I'll turn into a writer. Just like Harriet. But no cafeteria sandwiches for me--all I wanted was that plastic cup of vanilla-and-chocolate pudding, which I downed with a café-au-lait. I was better at dinnertime: made a meatloaf crammed with red onions, garlic, red bell peppers, spinach, carrots, Parmesan, and spaghetti sauce. Gulped that down with lemon polenta and South African red wine. Does that make up for my junk food day? And who am I asking? God, or a dietician? Certainly not the internet. If you ask me, that was one good meal. Even my kids thought so.