Breakfast at the Golden Arch

A Norman Rockwell Moment with an Egg Mc Muffin (served till 10AM)

I am the one with the Mc Muffin. I have arrived in time. The morning menu is being pulled during this slack time between Breakfast and the busy day.

This dining room is part of the Long Beach Melting Pot, serving the Pacific Rim and visitors from the South. I am a second-generation California native, a white, minority.

The tall couple took my interest when the pleasant, brown faced, wife felt of the table top of the two, person booth facing me. Next, she wiped it down with the paper napkin.

The husband appeared with their, eat- in order. That means a tray and no paper sack. (There will be an eat-in, tax added to their bill.) They sat down together, large for the small booth. Then I realized that they were Pacific Islanders. Round faced with athletic limbs. No tattoos showing, movement and posture signaling good health. I saw the movement of the man’s hand as he crossed himself. But, as he tapped his chest, I pulled my eyes away.

Evening Prayer

The little booth had become a Holy Place, a chapel without stained glass or candles. For some 30 seconds, I was seeing what could have been a Rockwell copy of the treasured Angelus: The standing couple with bowed, heads is now seated. The sunset* has become a new day. The cathedral bells are silenced by the traffic sounds of 2009.

*Today, art critics differ on Monet’s masterpiece. Debating whether or not we are being shown a sunrise or a sunset.

Nor do we agree how to pronounce the artist’s name. (My high school class of 1934 laughed aloud when I sounded the (T).

When we visited the Louver in Paris some years later, I remembered to silence the (T). The Parisian, at the counter, looked up to correct me with a proper Monet.

I had come home with a small print of this classic couple, and in my old age, I recognized them again today.

Newcomb