What’s for lunch today? Love.

Only a mother who loves her son unconditionally would pack such a lunch.

Corn tortillas individually rolled in Saran wrap and filled with saucy beef, a few onions, and a dash of La Victoria green taco sauce. Fresh green grapes in a paper towel and in a Ziploc baggie. Watermelon in cubes in another sack. Fritos for salt. Crackers with almond butter. A cool water. Clippings of newspaper for the journey, carefully cut out over the past months and saved in a spot—just for me. Carrot sticks sliced just right. Even cucumber quartered with the skill and patience of a sous chef.

I’m 8-years old again. But this time I appreciate it.

It wasn’t at the counter at the deli. I’m not even at a hotel with room service. This is my mother. This is for me. Who else would create such an elaborate spread that could feed me for days? Who puts a sheet of paper towel in with the grapes so they don’t get too moist and, technically, yucky? Who enjoys making such a lunch and thinks so altruistically, who thinks of someone else before themselves? What is that? How does that work?

It’s simple: it’s family, it’s love, it’s loving others more than yourself.

Small ice packs are strategically placed to keep things cool for the long day on the train. There are napkins and even a bin of hummus for those carrots and cucumber. Two apples, more gluten-free crackers, a few more chips of another variety. It’s a good thing the train is slow and takes all day. I get to enjoy this the entire trip.

An airplane from Los Angeles to San Francisco takes less than an hour. I think it’s 50 minutes. It takes 10 or 15 minutes to get up to altitude then about the same to descend. When do you have time for little burritos? Watermelon cubes? Little round crackers with almond butter? There’s no time for shift, for transitioning from one place to another. No time for the paper towel to soak up the moisture and no time for me to soak up the love that my mother sends along with me in the plastic-lined paper bag.

I’m taking the time. I’m soaking up the moments, the love that is sent along. I take it all in and absorb it through every pore in my skin and then through all cells of my body. Love permeates all and enters were it needs to be. It searches my body for where it will be most helpful, for where it can heal and mend, where it can calm and soothe, care and nourish, replenish and create.

And this all from a few grapes and corn tortillas? Aha, yes, confusing to the untrained eye, I know. They are the messengers. Is beauty not in the eye of the beholder? Is love not in the view of the recipient? It is what you make it out to be. It is what you feel it is, but what you not-so-secretly know is the truth. Is there anything more powerful than grapes nestled in a paper towel? When you can decipher the code in which it is wrapped, you can understand the language in which it is written and you receive what was gifted to you.

Take it to the lab and they’ll come back with the results, it’s 100% pure and unconditional love.

As Bill Murray so poetically states in Caddyshack, “So, I’ve got that going for me.”