"For even saintly folk will act like sinners / unless they have their customary dinners."

 Bertolt Brecht, The Threepenny Opera

 

           We decide to celebrate the Fourth of July at Parker's Dam. There's not much to celebrate. JJ's been laid off at the railroad yard, and there's only enough food left for the kids' breakfast. I'd go to the Salvation Army for help, but today's a holiday. 

             Chris and Rosebud sit at the table, wiping the last of the bread against the sides of the almost-empty jelly jar. If we go to the lake, I remind them, there's nothing for a picnic lunch.

            "That's okay," Chris says. "What's the difference if we're hungry here or hungry there?" 

            

            Chris and Rosebud love Parker's Dam. When JJ turns off the pitted blacktop onto the smooth sandy lane leading to the lake, I remember why. Wild daisies fringe the road. A dense pine forest rises behind them. Between the trees, glimpses of glittering water. 

            JJ parks the car and we shuck off our clothes. Then we hip-hop barefooted across the hot gravel road.

            "There it is, Mom!" Rosebud shouts when she sees the water. 

           The beach is crowded with families. Grandparents sit in aluminum lawn chairs beneath umbrellas. Middle-aged matrons wade along the shoreline, tugging self-consciously at modest one-piece swimsuits. Teenage girls prance up and down the beach in pairs. Everywhere there are children, running and jumping and splashing.

            "Can we go swimming now?" Chris begs.

            "Go for it," JJ says. "Just make sure the sharks don't eat your little sister."

            "There aren't any sharks, JJ," Rosebud says, grinning.

            Then, running after her big brother, "There aren't any sharks in there, is there, Chris?"

            I lay down on my stomach, my head propped in my hands. I admire my children's sturdy little bodies, cavorting in the water. The sky is clear and blue. The sun is high and white-bright.  

            "Gorgeous day," I murmur. "This was a good idea."

            

           When the sun is overhead, swimmers begin slogging out of the water. One by one, families head for the picnic grounds. Later, one by one, they return. Men poke at their teeth with toothpicks. Women wrap beach towels around their middles. Children sip from half-empty soda bottles. 

            "Wanna play volleyball?" Chris asks a boy his age. 

            The boy gnaws on a fried chicken leg, his chin shiny.  When he's finished, he tosses the bone, overhand, into the trashcan. "Sure," he says.

            I watch the way Chris and Rosebud's eyes follow the bone as it twirls end over end. The hunger in those eyes hurts. For a moment, I shut my own.

            "I'm going to the restroom," I tell JJ. 

            The bathrooms in the park—small brown buildings that look like miniature log cabins—are near the picnic grounds. It isn't until I'm walking back from them that I notice all the food piled on the picnic tables.  There are big Tupperware containers of leftover hamburgers and hot dogs. Bowls of potato salad under wax paper. Watermelons bobbing in melted ice. 

            It doesn't seem fair my kids are hungry, I think, when most of this will be thrown away. 

 

           "You should see all the food back there," I tell JJ, plopping down beside him. "Just sitting there drawing flies."

             He's on his back, eyes closed. Now he sits up.

            "Nobody there?"

            "Nope. They're all here. Swimming."

            I pick up a discarded straw and draw slow circles in the sand. "I know it would be wrong. I know it would be stealing, but..." 

             JJ stands, takes my hand, and pulls me up. 

            We get Chris and Rosebud out of the lake and sit them down on the blanket with strict instructions to stay put. The inside of the car is like an oven. Neither of us says a word until the picnic tables come into view. 

             I get out of the car, then lean back in through the window. "Keep the engine running," I tell JJ. 

            I notice two tables that have been dragged together. Five picnic baskets sit on the bench seats. A family reunion, I think. If I take one basket, they'll still have plenty left. I sprint to the tables, swoop down on a big wicker basket, and run back to the car. I stash it in the trunk. 

            "Whooeee!" JJ cries as we drive off.

            We return to the beach for Chris and Rosebud, who have to be persuaded to leave, then speed away from Parker's Dam. We're five miles down the highway before it occurs to me I may have made a pact with the devil for nothing more than a basket full of stained napkins, soiled paper plates, and dirty plastic forks. I ask JJ to stop so I can check the trunk.

            Oh. My. Gawd.

            Inside the basket, there's a big package of hamburger, the mound of blood-red beef still in long spaghetti-strands. Three large clumps of Thompson seedless grapes are piled on the other side. The grapes are such a shiny, white-streaked green, they look like they've been individually polished. I grab some for the kids to eat in the car.

            "These are so juicy, Mom," Rosebud says, reaching for more. "When you bite them, they explode in your mouth."

            When we get back, we stop at the city park. Chris and Rosebud play Frisbee with a neighboring family while I arrange hamburger patties on one of the small public grills. The kids' voices rise and fall, clear and sweet, as they play. The hamburgers sizzle and sputter. Someone lights firecrackers, the sound a long string of pop-pop-pops.

            When we sit down to eat, we're quiet and focused. We chew our hamburgers slowly, savoring the taste. I think about the family reunion people, back at Parker's Dam, discovering one of their baskets is missing. I tell myself they'll think it was left behind. There'll be some good-natured teasing, but they'll still have plenty of food for dinner. 

            "Good burgers, Mom," Chris says. He has a pinkish stain on his tee-shirt. I have a matching stain on my conscience—I'd die if my children knew what I did—but neither of them seems to wonder where dinner came from. 

            We finish eating at the same time. All around the picnic table there are full bellies and big greasy grins.

            When the fireworks are about to begin, we gather on our blanket. JJ slings one arm around my shoulders. Chris leans against my other side, and I put an arm around him. Rosebud reclines between JJ's legs. The first rocket soars into the air, makes a loud BOOM, and bursts over our heads in a dazzling shower of red, white, and blue stars. "Ahhh," the kids murmur. More rockets rain stars of different colors. 

            The finale is six rockets, set off one after the other, that fill the night sky with a colorful confetti. For minutes after the show, smoke clouds the air. 

            The kids are tired, their sweaty tee-shirts stretched tight over their bellies, their eyelids at half-mast. JJ carries Chris to the car. I hoist Rosebud onto my hip and follow. I feel her damp hair on my bare shoulder. When I turn my head to kiss her, I smell lake water.

            That night, as I tuck the kids into bed, I give thanks for the food.  I promise myself I'll pay it forward.