Packing Lunches

I’ll admit it; I’ve gotten a bit out of the habit of packing my partner’s lunches. However, I did this morning, so that makes up for the last several months, right?

Packing a lunch for your partner or the kiddos before they are off to work and school is one of those iconic homemaker duties that my brain always conjures up when I think “homemaker.” Sometimes January Jones’s character Betsy, from the TV show Mad Men, decked out in a chiffon nightgown with a cigarette and cup of coffee in one hand while she makes sandwiches with her free one pops up, but that could just be because we recently Netflixed the first couple seasons. Most of the time it is the traditional perky 50s era housewife who magically had the time to not only pack all the lunches for her husband and three kids, but managed to make a five course breakfast as well, and all without making a mess in the kitchen or getting anything on her apron. I don’t look like either of these, dressed in flannel pajama bottoms with whatever T-shirt I wore the day before and my hair sticking up in every direction, mumbling incoherently to the various four-legged creatures that yes, yes, I will feed them before my throat realizes I am awake and I go into a coughing fit for the next hour as if trying to exorcise a demon or I am Gollum from The Lord of the Rings.

“No, no! Too sexy! Tooooo sexxxxxyyy!!!”

Anyway, so it got me thinking, what is it about packing a lunch that makes it such an iconic image for me? And then it hit me; food. Breakfast and dinner are made at home, and to complete the day’s meals, the homemaker packs a lunch. But how does one make that lunch seem special, like a home-cooked meal does? Or, does one even try? I racked my brain and decided that, well, sometimes a sack lunch is just a sack lunch. But, sometimes, it is fun to pack a little something extra, like a little note that says, “I love you!” or a cookie, or maybe a clue as to what to anticipate when they get home. It doesn’t have to be all the time, but a few times a year will satisfy both your need to be nurturing, and their needs to be nurtured.