my sister brings dinner (lyn)

Jean arrives around noon with a trunk full of food and 6 teenagers --- my 17-year-old niece Sally (along with four of her friends) and her almost-13 year old son Jack.  Trying to be helpful, Alexander and I rush to unload the car.  I take a big watermelon out of the trunk and it slips from my hands onto the driveway, and suffers a large crack as a result.  So much for being helpful.

The rest of the unloading goes better.  Bags of chips and Doritos.  Prepared hamburgers.  Cheese.  Kosher hotdogs. All kinds of rolls.  A big vat of homemade guacamole.  A creamy onion dip.  A huge tub of cold pasta salad with feta cheese and sundried tomatoes.  A blueberry crisp.  About 5 pounds of cooked chicken.  I’m gaining about five pounds just looking at it all.  Oh, and did I mention? Jean is probably the best cook in our family, and she’s up against some tough competition from my mother and sister Valerie.  I’m not in the running.

We all go to the beach, but it’s too windy to stay.  I am usually able to sit on the beach for hours, but the sand in my hair and in my ears make it too uncomfortable.  I come home and play gin with my mother, and again I lose.

It’s a beautiful night and the kids gather on the deck and the adults congregate on the screened in porch. Dinner is a smorgasbord of fattening foods, and everything looks fabulous.  First the dips.  I eat too many chips and guacamole.  Then the main course.  One burger with cheese on a bun.  I sneak into the kitchen and count out 14 Pringle Lights, as if that will make much of a difference.  I hope no one will catch me but someone does.  It hardly seems worth an explanation when I’m eating a burger for dinner and devouring my sister’s incredible blueberry crisp.

Jean’s plate includes no Pringle Lights but does have on it, in addition to a cheeseburger, a side of pasta salad and a delicious-looking grilled Chinese sausage.   She’s my height, eats whatever she wants, and weighs 114 pounds.