Sophia Makes Some Breakfast

It was six o’clock in the morning on Saturday, still dark, and all seven of Sophia’s brothers and sisters were sleeping soundly. But she was awake; there was no chance of her going back to sleep now. Down the stairs she went, on tiptoe, enjoying the silence of the house and pushing thoughts of pre-dawn monsters out of her head.

Sophia was almost always first up. She had curly brown hair, dark eyes, and was almost the youngest, except for Tasia. She liked doing things for herself, so, after looking at a few picture books, she decided to make some breakfast. With three years tucked under her belt, she thought it would be pretty easy. She was wrong.

The first thing she wanted to make was eggs. Sophia loved eggs, especially the way her nanny Mary made them. Not only that, but it was fun to cook eggs, to watch them sizzle and pop.

She opened the fridge and found the egg carton. It was a bit heavier than she expected, but she managed to place it on the floor. (Sophia knew that Mary and Dad and the big kids cooked on the counter and stove, but she was too little to reach) But as she opened the carton and picked out a nice, white egg, she realized she could not remember how it was that Mary did it. She knew that the egg sizzled and popped and the clear part turned white, but she was not quite sure how it happened. After a little consideration, she thought, To make an egg you have to to crack it. I know that.

So Sophia cracked the egg. On the floor, of, course; the counter was much too high. And there was the egg, spilled out on the floor, but it wasn’t sizzling or popping or turning white. The only part that looked at all right was the yolk.

Sophia found another egg. If it didn’t work the first time, maybe it would work the second. She cracked it open, less carefully than the first, and the clear fluid and yellow yolk spilled out. Now, she may have forgotten how to cook good eggs, but she remembered one thing: raw eggs were slimy, and tasted nasty. And she was angry at the nasty raw eggs for not turning into nice cooked eggs like they were supposed to.

Maybe it only works if you crack it on the counter, she thought. This was a frustrating thought, since the counter was so uncomfortably high. She picked out a third egg and looked at it gloomily. Then she had an inspiration; she could throw the egg at the counter. Sophia had never seen Mary throw an egg before, but at this point, she was willing to try anything. Swish went the egg into the air, and crack! it hit the edge of the counter. The raw egg plopped down to the floor.

Sophia watched it carefully for any signs of sizzling or popping or turning white. But the nasty raw egg just sat on the floor, looking more and more not cooked the more she looked at it. Now she was mad, really mad. She picked up the egg carton, three round white eggs left inside, and tipped them out onto the floor.

Crack! Crack! Splat! went them all, and Sophia, her vengeance satiated, decided that if eggs were not going to work, then cereal would have to do. She knew that cereal was easy because even Janae who was six could make it.

It wasn’t difficult to find a box of Honey-Nut Cheerios in the pantry, but the milk was a different matter. Only because it was half-full was Sophia able to drag it out of the fridge onto the floor. Panting and sweating, she sat down, trying to remember how to make cereal. Well, she thought, first you have to pour the cereal. 

So she poured the cereal. The Honey-Nut Cheerios mounded up on the kitchen tiles. Already Sophia had an inkling there was something not quite right, but she had been denied her breakfast too long to care about specifics. Next she poured the milk, which was much more difficult. She ended up just tipping the container over and spilling the milk all over the floor, but some of it spilled into the Cheerios. Which ought to work, Sophia thought.

But it didn’t. There were the Cheerios, scattered on the floor, and there was the milk, running all over the kitchen and filling the cracks between tiles, but still it did not look like how cereal ought to look. And then it dawned on her. A bowl! Of course, that was what she needed. 

But, oh, the unfairness of the world. The bowls were in the high kitchen cupboards, even higher than Mary could reach—Dad altitude. Just my luck, thought Sophia.

But in the end Sophia got her breakfast. Janae and Eric woke up an hour later, and everyone had some waffles. Janae spilled a little syrup on her chair, but no so much, only enough that her waffle got stuck to it. Then they all played Nest, which was gathering all the blankets and pillows into a big pile and then jumping inside.

After a long while, some of the older kids came downstairs. They seemed very, very angry that there were eggs and cereal on the floor. And Dad looked especially tired when he woke up that morning.

But Sophia didn’t really understand why. She had just wanted to make some breakfast.

Note: I remember waking up one morning and finding such a mess in the kitchen that I went back upstairs instead of trying to clean it up. This story is inspired by that day, when Sophia's weekly attempts to make breakfast early on a Saturday mounted to the biggest mess yet. Later on, when she was about eight, Sophia described her “breakfast-making” thought process to me: how she felt as a three-year-old trying to make her own food. I elaborated a bit, but it is all based on what she told me.