Sep 22, 2023 4 min read

Magic Chicken, it’s called, and it was a regular part of our family life for most of the years the kids were at home. The recipe came from a little book put together by the PTA at the preschool my son was attending.

Not sure it’s magic, but it’s a good way to make chicken. Just coat the breasts in a mixture of parmesan cheese and Italian breadcrumbs, put them into a baking dish and pour some melted butter over them. Then bake.

I’d make it with mashed potatoes and broccoli at least once a week. Everybody liked it, and the chicken wasn’t dry, which is rare around here, given my tendency to overcook things.

My son and his fiancé are coming in from the west coast this evening, and Magic Chicken will be on the menu. When I asked my son what he’d like for dinner he waved it off, saying we could get pizza. But that doesn’t seem right.

Home cooking seems to be required in this case. Except for our frequent FaceTime chats, I’ve not laid eyes on him since last January; it’s an eternity. My missing him has lately dropped me into moments of true sadness. I’ve found myself feeling jealous of friends whose children and grandchildren are close by. I tell them how fortunate they are to be at this stage of life with all their young people around them, but they know that. Down beneath the envy, I’m happy for them.

What a strange, unsettled stage of life this is – to be approaching mid-60s and still working full time, to be healthy enough to do everything I’ve always done, but to be missing (both physically and emotionally) the things that have always been around me. If I point my arms, I’ve got one child living at 7 on the dial and the other at 12 noon. Midpoint between the two would put me in the middle of Nebraska, and what would I do there? And I’d still be many hundreds of miles away from each of them.

“Get an RV and drive back and forth,” a friend suggested. I will drive around a block eight times to avoid parallel parking, so I’m guessing that my backing into a parking space at an RV park would be problematic – not to mention the on-board bathrooms and showering at rest stops. Nope.

It’s a fact of life, this missing our people. When my kids were very small, I missed the adult interaction that came with being at work. Those days were long and sometimes lonely, even though I was surrounded by sweet children. Now, my work life is busy and I have lots of social interaction. But there’s this itch I’m always trying to scratch. The phone and video calls help, but it’s not the same.

My son and his fiancé are coming for a wedding, and it’s a quick overnight visit. I’ll make Magic Chicken and potatoes and broccoli for dinner and then French toast for breakfast. It’s funny how we moms frame things with meals when our kids are around even now, a reminder of the years when breakfast, lunch and dinner provided structure in days that could seem to stretch on forever. I hate to say it, but there were days when I wished their bedtime would come sooner. A friend and I agree we would pay thousands of dollars to have one of those days back, just to relive it with our little ones.

Now, I’ll be getting 20 hours or so with my grown kid. It’s not enough, but it’s a gift. We’ll have to talk fast to get all caught up. We’ll do it over Magic Chicken.