Cold Pizza

When my brothers and I were kids my family ordered pizza every Friday night. It was really good pizza with thick chewy crust, loads of small pepperoni slices, thick sliced mushrooms and sweet sauce. The pizzas were huge pies sliced into squares, so that along the outside there were always four rounded small pieces. We loved grabbing those little pieces on the edge.

We could never eat the whole pizza, so there were always leftovers in the fridge on Saturday morning. And that was perfect. Because, next to Friday night, Saturday morning was by far our favorite time of the week. Our parents stayed in bed and slept in. And my brothers and I padded down the stairs in our jammies, turned on Saturday morning cartoons, wrapped ourselves in the afghan our Grandmother made, and ate cold pizza. It was heaven.

Tom and Jerry. Bugs Bunny. Scooby Doo. And the Roadrunner. The rule was that we couldn't wake up our parents until the Roadrunner came on. It was Dad's favorite. And when we were having a truly perfect Saturday morning, we'd succeed in rousting Dad out of bed and he'd come grumbling down the stairs and snuggle with us under the afghan, his hair all messy and his stocking feet sticking out. And it wasn't long before we were all laughing at the utterly unfortunate Coyote. Acordian-Coyote. Hanging-in-the-air-before-falling-Coyote. Flat-Coyote. Holding-a-sign-saying-Help!-Coyote.

It was usually winter. We were huddled in front of a 9" black and white TV. The pizza was cold. We were warm. No one was bickering. The cat blinked at us with her usual superiority. And there we were under the afghan, laughing out loud at jokes we all understood. We were happy.