Supper

At nine, Ben decided to grade the quality of my nightly suppers. He drew up a little scorecard with columns and rows, basing his system on a scale of "great" to "bad". He posted it at the foot of his top bunk, and every night before prayers I would hang over the side to receive my score. The first evening was "taco night" so my rating was flatteringly high. Spring-boarding from that success, all subsequent meals were prepared for the sole delight of Ben. I watched each night as he graded my offerings with his mangled half-pencil. He took himself quite seriously, growing careless of my feelings. He gave me "so-so's"; He was unimpressed with spaghetti night; and he discounted all dessert entries as superfluous. He broke my heart.

When I whined, he shrugged, refusing to baby me - free enterprise and the spirit of competition and the like. As Luke came to the realization that I was tailoring our dinners to Ben's preferences in order to rate high scores, he whined his own whine - to which I shrugged my own shrug.

After two weeks, unable to pull much more from my bag of tricks, I gave up. Ben was already growing bored and uninspired, so the little card was taken down. I wonder if I kept it in his memory box. It would not be unlike me.