Recently, I took my son to visit the college he’s going to attend, and there was quite a scene.
Oh, nothing was amiss at Cornell University, where Jackson’s planning to go. It’s great.
No, I refer, of course, to the happenings at the breakfast nook at the hotel where we stayed.
You know what I’m talking about. The place off the lobby where you sit and eat the continental breakfast with all the other hapless folk from out of town.
Now, in the abstract, the free meal is something I enjoy. Why is it that the more expensive the hotel is, the fewer amenities it offers for no extra charge? Shouldn’t you get MORE for the extra money you’re forking out? But no, you have to pay to park — and for your first meal of the day — if you stay at what’s supposed to be a classier joint.
The place where we were was really fine, save for the fact that the outside door near our room didn’t lock, which conjured fears in my mind of an ax murderer getting us in the middle of the night. (None did.)
No, but as much as I like, for example, the make-your-own-waffle station at the free breakfast area, I can’t help but feel a bit of unease during the eating hour.
As far as I’m concerned, Jackson is already more prepared for college than I was at his age simply because he knows how to use the machine to make the waffles.
When I was a freshman at William & Mary, I definitely got yelled at by a cafeteria worker because I forgot to use the nonstick spray, which meant my waffle stuck and had to be retrieved small piece by small piece.
Now I know how to use the waffle-maker. I just don’t like that the people waiting in line behind you do so impatiently, as if you’re about to make them miss an important meeting with the people who stayed in the more expensive hotel across town.
It’s like you’re in their way — and then, in turn, they’re in your way when you go back to collect the butter and syrup packets you forgot to get initially.
And God forbid you have to step away while cooking to get a fork. They’ll lunge forward as if trying, desperately, to reach the finishing line at a foot race.
So all of this commotion means you have to make your break for the waffles as soon as you enter the breakfast area because you don’t know how long all of the rigmarole will take. You can’t be messing around in the lobby like the guy I saw with his hair standing up who was still buttoning his shirt. He looked like I felt.
Then there’s usually an overzealous employee there, too, who scrambles around filling up the eggs and collecting wayward trash as if national security depended solely on his effort.
Jackson refused to eat the eggs at our hotel, by the way, because he was sure they were powdered. When he said this, it ruined them for me, too. So I didn’t have any of those — or the battleship-gray sausage links.
I also felt sorry for a seemingly well-behaved kid I saw whose mom was haranguing him about something that at least wasn’t apparent to me.
Yes, this is why I won’t ever stay at a bed-and-breakfast. I’m a severe night person, and I really don’t want to interact with anyone in the morning whom I don’t already know.
Maybe I shouldn’t be such a hard-hearted sort, though. I did appreciate that the hotel had 24-hour coffee service.
And I felt bad when the overzealous employee at the hotel enthusiastically said, “Have a good day!” when we left breakfast.
I should also probably count my blessings that I wasn’t worried then — and I’m not worried now — about how my only child will do in college. He’ll do splendidly. Nope, I was worried about gobbling my waffle in peace.
Now that I think about it, there’s a tinge of irony at play in this story, as well.
Jackson’s going to attend Cornell’s Brooks School of Public Policy. But you know what another popular major at the university is?
Hotel management.
