The Portland breakfast

I was in Portland a few hours ago and my husband and I sat down for breakfast at one of those popular and trendy breakfast restaurants and almost immediately felt that dread that can ruin any meal, a single parent with three kids. 

I was once a single parent with three children, so I know the glare that adults give to single parents and now that I am an adult who travels without children, I have mastered the glare that adults give to other adults who happen into restaurants with their out of control children. 

See, adults don’t want to share meals with children, especially meals we are paying for. Sure, if you invite me over to your toy cluttered house and offer me some luke warm pizza and a beer and your out of control children are running around and screaming, I love it. On the other hand, if I am paying for a fine meal and a decent bottle of wine (yes I drink wine at breakfast, I’m an adult) I do not want your screaming children walking up to my table and pointing at my blueberry pancakes and pointing and saying “whats that?”

So, there we were, reading over the beautiful and trendy menu of the sophisticated and well designed boutique eatery and within seconds a father sat at the table across from us, with his three young sons and I rolled my eyes in such a dramatic way that my ankle was immediately kicked by my ever polite husband. “What?” I said in some sort of shocked way, as if three young boys and a sleep deprived father was an obvious ticket to torture of our cultured and quiet meal time. 

We ordered and for the first five minutes I waited for these young boys to explode or act out or so something that would ruin my meal. Because the restaurant was busy, it took a little longer for the plates to show at our table, but when they did, I had begun to notice that the table closest  to ours, the one with the three boys had remained under control, and noticeably quiet. 

As our plates were settled in front of us I glanced at the table and all three young boys were reading books, their father working his way through the editorial pages of the Sunday paper and sipping a coffee. It was quiet and peaceful. They as a table could care less about us. 

So, while I was all prepared to complain and cry because parents today are terrible and their children are out of control, irresponsible mongrels with no sense of decorum, there I sat, mere inches away from a table of well mannered and sophisticated young men and a father who cared and role modeled behavior that his sons appreciated. 

When we were leaving I thanked the father for having children who could be in public without being obnoxious. He looked at me like I might be insane.