I like breakfast cake. That and coffee are what I eat. The cake can be a cookie but it must be soft, the consistency of cake. Crispy comports ill with dawn.

What moral lessons might I derive from this habit? I am always sniffing for the meaning of things, as Henry for comestibles. Nourishment can be located in the most surprising places, if you set your mind to it. Some extractions require more digging.

I like conventional breakfast food OK but not preparing it. Eggs, bacon, toast, jam and the resultant dirty dishes stand between me and my laptop. Some people rev up during the day, reaching peak performance by dusk (Jane, for example). I’m the opposite, a wind-up clock slackening with each tick. An hour for me is not an hour. With luck I’ve got maybe six hours of lucidity a day, for the rest I’m robotic. Day’s duties don’t require much thought. Shopping, cooking, walking Henry, web-surfing, answering emails, I can be yawning my head off. But not composing.

I’m picky about my breakfast cake, pickier with age. I have several favorites, which I alternate, so my palate doesn’t lose interest. Predictability befouls human food, making our world feel small. Henry seems to prefer monotony. His response when I cook for him is often to throw up.

I prefer no one cake. To alter the old song,

Ten hours without ingestion guarantee appetite. (“Appetite is the best condiment,” sniffed legendary chef Brillat-Savarin.) Rest gives me strength gives me hope. Coffee fumes excite like an opiate. What mightn’t I extrude today!

My cake selection is limited by what’s on offer locally. I don’t mind cooking but I refuse to bake. Baking one must follow instructions. I’m allergic to instructions of any sort. I rip open electronic gizmos and try figuring them out, until rescued by a younger relation. Ditto with cookbooks. The specious specificity of recipes makes me roll my eyes: exactly a half-cup of this or teaspoon of that. “Season to taste” seems the only honest guidance.

Cakes available locally:

From DeCicco’s (our gourmet supermarket):

·      fancy coffee cakes (unfrozen, pricey)

·      baked doughnuts (I kid you not)

·      cider-house doughnuts (in apple season)

·      panettone (to return us to Rome)

From McKinney and Doyle bakery:

·      seasonally suitable poundcakes (pumpkin, zucchini, blueberry, etc.) which I slather with cream cheese (“original,” naturally – no dieting at dawn)

·      on occasion one of their glistening brown pastries (though this way madness lies)

From Shoprite, down the street, if I’ve failed to stock up on costlier fare:

·      Entenmann’s doughnut holes – or “pop ‘ems” (a depiction I deplore). This admittedly plebeian dish is made magical – moist, warm, melting – by a four-second microwave. I strictly delimit myself to three pop-‘ems, though sometimes my constraints do not hold. (“Why not?” -- “Life is short” -- “Where’s the harm?” – muttered sotto voce are adverse indicators.) (P.S. – prematurely: Warmed pop-‘ems craze Henry too.)

It takes far longer to describe my breakfast cakes than devour them. I do not nibble, I gobble. Often at such moments I hear my mother chiding my table manners. I stare out the kitchen window at the wonder of the world.

And the moral of this negligible chapter of my personal history? Let me test a few:

·      Though my mind strives to be a democrat, my mouth’s an aristocrat.

·      Trifling experiences may matter inordinately. We admire what we admire, not what we ought. Reason is the puppet of our emotions.

·      Breakfast is worth getting up for.

·      The wonder of the world is up to us.