Inspiration

Oops! I Forgot!

By Karen Hossink

Inspiration

It was time for dinner and I was happy. I was making one of my favorite meals, Pork Chops with Orange Rice. I especially love the orange-flavored rice and was looking forward to enjoying this meal with my family.

The recipe for this dish is soooo simple, and the results soooo yummy I actually got it published in my favorite cooking magazine several years ago. Really, all you do is season pork chops with salt and pepper and brown them in cooking oil. Place 1 1/3 cups instant rice in a greased casserole dish, then pour one cup of orange juice over the rice and top the rice with the browned pork chops. Pour a can of chicken with rice soup over it all, cover it and bake it at 350 degrees for 20 minutes. Uncover and bake 10 more minutes. So simple! Too simple to mess up, right? You'd think so.

As I brought dinner to the table, I noticed the rice around the edges looked a little dry. That happens sometimes, and when it does I just avoid these areas. But as I looked at the rice again, I realized why it was dry. I'd forgotten to pour orange juice over the rice.

Awwww. How could I have done that? This recipe is so simple. Somehow I'd managed to mess it up anyway.

My family was very gracious. They avoided the rice as best as they could, and just smiled politely as they spit out crunchy pieces. Fortunately, the pork chops were still good and the bread was yummy. It wasn't a total loss. I still felt stupid for forgetting the orange juice, though. I mean, come on, I had been making this recipe for fourteen years.

When it was time for the kids to start getting ready for bed, I directed Matthew - my youngest son - to get into the shower and I started washing the dishes. Quite often, Matthew needs close supervision in order to complete his tasks. More than once, I have walked into the bathroom to ask if he's almost finished with his shower only to find out he's simply been standing under the running water and hasn't even started washing yet. But this time he got the job done without much intervention.

I returned to the kitchen and was only barely aware of what my son was doing for the next several minutes. Then I realized Matthew was standing in the dining room, still dripping wet. I called out from the kitchen, "Matthew, how about drying off and getting into your pajamas?" He perked up and said, "Oh yeah," with the tone of voice that said, So that's what I'm supposed to do after I get out of the shower. I'm supposed to use this towel Mom gave me to dry off. Then since I'm naked, I should put something on my body, and since it's time for bed I may as well put on pajamas. Yeah, this all makes sense now.

I noted his tone of voice and thought to myself, Oh, Matthew. You're almost seven years old. Getting ready for bed is not a new thing anymore. You know what to do!

Just then, I looked down at the dishes in the sink. Sitting right in front of me was the casserole dish. The one with dried rice stuck to it. I thought about that simple recipe I had been preparing for some fourteen years. The one that is too simple to mess up. I thought about the fact I had forgotten to put the orange juice in the Pork Chops with Orange Rice. And I thought, Maybe I need to give Matthew a little more grace.

Karen Hossink is the author of Confessions of an Irritable Mother: Hope for Overwhelmed Moms. She is writing her second book, Finding Joy, from Okemos, Michigan, where she lives with her husband and three children. Check out her website at Irritable Mother and her blog at http://surviving-motherhood.blogspot.com.