Dinner Party Disaster - a 5 Minute Freewrite

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Day 448 : 5 Minute Freewrite: Friday - Prompt: fire alarm

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As a newlywed, this was the first meal I was going to prepare for guests. We had invited my brother-in-law and his wife over for dinner and an evening of card playing. I was 17 years old and we’d only been married for a couple of months. Randy’s brother was older than him by 8 years and he and his wife had been married for several years. Judy, in fact, intimidated me. She seemed so well put together and organized. The perfect wife and homemaker.

Why, oh why, did I pick fried chicken to cook as my first meal? I wouldn’t chose that now, as an experienced cook of 40 years. But that day certainly stands out in my memory. Here I am standing at the stove with a cast iron skillet of chicken frying and splattering grease all over my just cleaned kitchen. I have some scalloped potatoes in the oven, the real made from scratch kind, not out of a box. White sauce was something I was good at! Unlike fried chicken. I hear the car pull up, our company arriving. Was it really time for them to be here already? I looked around the kitchen in panic seeing that I had only half way finished setting the table. The reason I hadn’t finished was because I could only find 3 of the 4 napkin rings. I had such high hopes of making a sophisticated looking table.

While I was hurriedly pulling the 3 napkin rings off and rearranging the napkins and silver ware, the front door opened and it was time to meet and greet. I know my face was red (both from nerves and from the heat of the kitchen) and as I was standing at the door giving out hugs - the fire alarm starts blaring in the kitchen. Of course you know how this story ends - the chicken was burning and the kitchen was filling with smoke. First dinner - disaster!