56 Comments

Starting with the marmalade, you’re describing a perfect morning. Just wish I were in the City to replicate it. But I can enjoy my own Tiptree Tawny Orange Thick Cut as I look out on my snowy side yard. I long ago discovered that small luxuries help keep me sane. And I’ll conjure a memory of subway riding bliss.

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I will never understand the attraction of marmalade. My toasted english muffin will be topped with homemade crab apple jelly, giving me a few unneeded calories and a sense of self sufficiency at having made it myself from my very own organic, heirloom crabapples. Nice to know that a Minnesotan saved us from burnt toast.

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We will gladly enroll you in our marmalade program and ease you into the appreciation you deserve.

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Our Sunday morning breakfast used to be marmalade on a toasted English muffin (kinda sparse but supplemented by goodies at the coffee hour at our Lutheran church in Bangor). I kept this up for a couple of years but then got a small sandwich grille and now I have a grilled sandwich of sausage, cheese slice, and egg on an English Muffin.

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Talk of marmalade and crab apple jelly have driven me to tip my hat to that humble, true midwestern treat that belongs on toasted bread and muffin alike and every other baked good you can think of - apple butter.

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Amen.

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Read and enjoyed today’s piece while having cinnamon toast and Tetley tea with milk. My toast is a nostalgic trip to my own childhood. Not sure what my Robertson ancestor enjoyed, though I have picked his namesake marmlade off the grocery shelf, only to make a connection to him. He was reportedly kidnapped off the streets of Edinbugh around 1700 when he was 12 years old and brought to Baltimore to work. I expect he never had cinnamon toast, but I hope that one day, he was able to relish marmalade on burnt toast.

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Long live the pop up toaster and whatever you choose to eat with it. Grape jelly is my choice!

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Grape jelly is excellent and works well with a layer of peanut butter under it. Oh, oh, now we are getting really decadent!

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Grape Jelly, or Strawberry Jam will work in a jam. But, I have my own homemade Pepper Jelly to give me flavorful start along with my glass of water with Raw Honey & Raw Vinegar ;-)

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I prefer All Fruit cherry jam but I haven't been able to get it for the last year. I've switched to blueberry (this is Maine after all) and seedless raspberry.

Nobody has mentioned honey, great for a sore throat or any time.

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Good morning, Garrison. Not marmalade but honey on toast in my mornings makes me happy along with a bowl of oatmeal with resins and walnuts and more honey. A banana and yogurt. The yogurt is every other morning. Coffee for a wash and all is well. The Omaha World Herald await reading until later, we watch C-SPAN for our morning news starter, all three of them. C-SPAN'S "Washington Journal" can be frustrating some mornings because of the lack of coherence and stuttering and downright dumb in many of the callers' words. Hoping for sun today. RRoeder

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I have found, Richard Roeder, that honey brings back an over due banana to its original state as far as flavor goes!

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Like my other reply, I also like honey on toast. I read the comics and do the crossword in the Bangor Daly News with one ear on the Today show, if before 7:25, otherwise start the classical music for the day.

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Jan 17Edited

It’s the little things that count. And speaking of the delights of Manhattan street food, there used to be a little stand off the corner of 54th St. & 5th Avenue, called Hallo Berlin. They served bratwurst on a toasted Kaiser role with mustard and sauerkraut. It was the best $3.50 I ever spent. Thanks for reminding me!

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I am going to take a more nearsighted view of life more of the time so I don't miss the important small things right in front of me....thanks for the inspiration.

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Great read with so many messages. The one that catches my eye and heart is to live each day to it's fullest. Orange marmalade sounds like heaven to me today as well, as does a walk outside (in my case, with my client's pooches), a conversation or two and a nice big THANK YOU to the powers that keep me going. Once you realize that living each day as the gift it truly is, is the way to go, you find there is absolutely no other way to live.

Have a wonderful day, stay warm (or not), enjoy the sun and the breeze on your face and for God's sake, eat that marmalade!!

😎🤗🍊🍞🌞🌅🚶‍♀️🚶

I shared this on FB. Mr. Keillor is a warm smile to my mornings.

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GK is happy in the morning with his toast and marmalade. I too favor the “nearsighted view” at dawn, which on reflection lends greater clarity, cheer, and ameliorative potential to the rest of the day. And to life. Same for lunch in the park, and writing (or thinking about it) in the reading room. Not sure about the subway though.

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The subway is the best way to travel. Fast. Efficient. Cheap. A great leveler. It runs 24 hours a day and you don't pay to park.

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Are you still submitting to The New Yorker? If so, the marmalade piece should be considered!

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I don't. I stepped aside to let the young and gifted take their turn.

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Garrison, your writing is French Orange Marmalade spread on hot buttered toast to me this morning.. just the thing I didn’t even wish for but found handed to me by the most wonderful user of words and enjoyer of tongue placed in cheek I’ve ever read.

Thank you, Sir. If you only knew how much you add to any morning you decide to talk about anything. You are orange marmalade with a French name.

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Oh Garrison! You evoke so many memories. Toasted english muffins or toast or, best of all, fresh out-of-the-oven popovers slathered with melted butter stuffed with orange marmalade. We moved to a town near-ish Salt Lake City 50 years ago from the flatlands near Chicago, and now we’re perched high on a mountain with both the far view and twinkling lights of the nearby town surrounded by soaring snowy mountains and the joy-filled near view of clouds of birds, crowds of elk, fox, coyotes, bobcats, deer and moose. For years, every week we listened to PHC, and once you came to SLC. I see you still in your red tennis shoes, red suspenders, spinning tales as you walked back and forth, eyes closed, across the stage, of Lake Wobegon, where the women are strong, the men are good looking, and all the children are above average. Thank you for YOU!

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I forgot about popovers, just butter on hot is sufficient. Haven't had any since my wife took ill and passed away more than 7 years ago. I think there's a mix which I may try for old times sake.

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Grandpas are like that. Grandma's too. The fact that they feed you or just allow you to watch color TV with them says "I love you" through actions instead of words. I'm a grumpy old grandpa myself. If I went around telling kids and grand kids "I love you" they would try to put me into an assisted dying facility.

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Maybe just try. Perhaps they could weather the shock! 😱

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Simple pleasures in this complicated world. Thank you for this gift. 💙

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I read somewhere that the working title for the melody of "Yesterday" was "Marmalade". Had the Beatles stuck with that theme I think their careers would have taken a very different trajectory.

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Marmalade,

Wherefore art thou are you Marmalade?

You're my favorite, one my grandma made

Oh, I do miss my marmalade

Where did you go? I don't know--

You've been mislaid

I have toasted bread,

But alas, no marmalade!

Marmalade

Orange and zesty little marmalade

Grandma's passed, and now to rest is laid

I'll never see more marmalade

hmmm, hmmm, hmmm, hmmm, hmm-hm-hmm

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True genius.

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You're much too kind, but thanks.

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We get a "Golden Oldies" show on Maine Classical Radio every Friday afternoon. On 1/19, that week of '64 featured the Beatles' "I want to hold your hand". They improved over the years since it sounded like childish yelling, not always in tune or on pitch.

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