A little taste of home at Christmas

Bud wasn't expecting presents for Christmas that year.

It was the height of the Great Depression, and he was living in a boarding house thousands of miles away from home. There wasn't money for gifts. Every dime was precious, and was needed for the family to survive.

But they WERE surviving — him in the East, and his parents and brothers out West — and that was gift enough during those trying times. He was just grateful for a day off from work, and he was looking forward to the sumptuous Christmas dinner Mrs. Rossi had promised to prepare.

Wonderfully savory smells drifted from Mrs. Rossi's kitchen as Bud showered and shaved and put on a clean white shirt and tie. Mrs. Rossi wasn't as good a cook as his mother was, but her culinary repertoire was significantly more exotic.

She had introduced him to pasta — something his mother had never prepared — and wondrous varieties of Italian cuisine. He had a special fondness for her spaghetti and meatballs, but that wasn't the smell coming from the kitchen. It was similar, but different — and it smelled similarly good, in a different sort of way.

One thing Bud knew for sure was that fresh homemade bread would be involved in the meal. He could pick out THAT smell from a thousand miles away. Bud was something of an expert on the smell of bread baking.

His father was a miller — his Star Mill was just a couple of hundred feet from the family's kitchen. And his mother took that good Star Mill flour and baked fresh bread for her six sons every day except Sunday. Just as his father could tell if something was amiss by the sound frequencies emanating from mill machinery, Bud had smelled enough baking bread that he could tell if a loaf was properly done by the aroma wafting from the oven.

And the bread Mrs. Rossi was baking was done. Perfectly.

As good as whatever it was that Mrs. Rossi was preparing as the main course of their boarding house Christmas dinner might be, Bud was most anxious to bite into a thick slice of that homemade bread, still hot out of the oven.

As soon as all six of his fellow residents were seated and a blessing on the food had been properly pronounced, Bud extended his long arms in a classic boarding house reach for the plate of bread.

"No, Bud," Mrs. Rossi said firmly. "That bread isn't for you."