The Comforts of Home

Today we're going to take a trip down memory lane. But first...I need to thank Nathanial for the topic idea for today. While I'm not completely going with the idea he suggested, it's what gave me the spark for the current idea (also you should totally check out his blog because he's a FAR better writer than I could ever hope to be).

A typical Saturday when I was about...8...involved the following: Dad cooking...Star Trek: The Next Generation, Babylon 5, and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

Every week (well almost every week. But in my memory it's every week) starting around 1 or 2 in the afternoon, Dad would start cooking dinner. This was a complicated process that involved many steps and hours of cooking. Dad has this way of understanding how spices and different foods interact to make the most wonderful combinations (a talent I wish I had inherited, but am sadly lacking...but am slowly learning!) and the house would smell amazing. If it was summer, part of this ritual would involve pulling out the grill and grilling whatever food was being made (and to this day, that still happens. Dad loves his grill). Dad's cooking is one of my favorite things about being home. I keep telling him he needs to teach me how to make all of the dishes he makes...he insists it's all about knowing how to add the correct amount of spices...so apparently that is a talent I will need to learn before I move out.

Now as a young child, I couldn't do much to help in the kitchen (and my version of "helping" usually involved eating all of the green peppers Dad had cut up for whatever he was making and then I would be banned from the kitchen....that's something that may or may not still happen today). On Saturday afternoons one of the TV channels (I cannot remember for the life of me which one) would play Star Trek: The Next Generation, Babylon 5, and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

When I tell people that I am a nerd, I really do mean it. I was raised to be a good and proper nerd by my parents.

I was completely enthralled with all three shows. Star Trek had always been a thing in my life...Mom and Dad watched it all the time so I knew what it was by an early age. Babylon 5 would go on to be something I watched on a constant basis in high school.

One of my happiest memories from growing up is those Saturdays where I would sit on the couch and watch science fiction shows while Dad made dinner. Sometimes Mom would join me, sometimes not. But it was a weekly thing for me. A weekly constant.

And still to this day...if Star Trek is on TV and Dad finds it while channel surfing...he'll stop and let the episode play. It's a thing we all have in common and can all take comfort in.

And Dad cooking while the TV plays some new thing that I can get engrossed in? Still totally a thing. And it happens all the time.