As I was video-chatting with one of my grandsons, our conversation drifted to a time in my marriage before my husband and I had children. I told this grandson that my first full-time teaching position was in the adjacent community of Jeffersontown, known to most of us as J-town. My husband Edgar was working as a machinist for the L & N Railroad South Louisville Shops, close to the University of Louisville Belknap Campus. For a period of time Edgar was working the graveyard shift, or, in this instance, maybe we could call it the nighttime “railroad yard shift.” I, of course, was teaching during a normal school day.

We found a unique way to greet each other as he was coming down the winding road to go home and go to bed and I was coming from the other direction on the same stretch of the woodsy route to my school. We would cautiously watch for each other’s car and safely stop so Edgar could hand me a bag through his open window to my outstretched hand through my window. Disclaimer here: if there were a car close upon us, we just didn’t stop. Miraculously, however, most mornings we were able to make our transaction!

What was the morning present he gave me on a usual Monday through Friday basis? Maybe you can guess. The small white bag scrunched down at the top was sometimes warm. I could many times smell the sweet aroma of something from a bakery. A doughnut? Yes!

But not just any doughnut . . . It was a Krispy Kreme doughnut! And let me give another disclaimer here that I was not given any incentive from Krispy Kreme to mention their product! My usual favorite was a crème-filled glazed doughnut (or occasionally crème-filled chocolate iced) that would be my morning treat when I got to my classroom. There was just enough time before students were released from the cafeteria—their early holding place—to go to class for me to enjoy my delectable doughnut with a cup of instant black coffee made warm on a little electric cup warmer.

Shot of sugar! Shot of Joe! That’s how I started the day in my early teaching career. Today breakfast is a boiled egg, toast w/butter and honey or jam (sometimes my own), and a fresh fruit. If you’re reading this and happen to know my grandkids, don’t tell them about that other “breakfast”! I’ve even sent them photos of my egg/toast/fruit breakfast to encourage them to practice good eating habits!

Laughable Lines and A Doughnut
Connie Carlisle Polley, 2020-2025
ConnieCarlislePolley.com
NonnyDay.com

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