I remember I was 6 yrs old, sitting down at the table just like every dinner. This one, as it turned out, was going to be very different. Now, as a 6 yr old, your world is very different. Your decision making skills are not quite as sharp as they are as an adult. The line between fantasy and reality are very blurry, the only side being somewhat clear is the fantasy side. My fantasy side was as clear as the muscles on Popeye after that can of spinach. I begged my mother for spinach from a can. Every Saturday at the grocery, I whined for a can of spinach. How does the saying go...“be careful what you wish for?” It took only one little fork full of that putrid, stringy, mushy, no good, nasty spinach to hit my mouth, Popeye you jack ass! Why would you temp young people into eating raw spinach?! So now the trust I put into my mother grew, because she at least warned me about the spinach; which leads me to this frightful night at the dinner table. On my plate was meatloaf, mashed potatoes and little green orbs. Some may even call them peas - Stokely USA, S & W, Green Giant - you get the picture. My trust in my mother was soon retracted; I would not like peas from a can. They vaguely resemble peas but taste like ass! They may taste even deeper than ass, more like shit. I could not eat them. “Not with a mouse, not in a house, not in a boat, not with a goat,” it wasn’t going to happen. Then my dad spoke those words every young person of my generation feared most, “You’re not leaving this table until you clean your plate!” I felt the tears beginning to roll down my cheeks. Salty tears or not, this was not going to be enough seasoning to get them into my mouth. How was I going to choke down 35 to 40 green nasty orbs of death? Ah ha! The greatest idea ever came into my little head, if I could swallow them whole, I wouldn’t have to chew them! Thirty minutes and four 12 ounce glasses of milk later, all of the peas were gone, one by one, swallowed like medicine. I slowly walked to my room and laid my teary face on my pillow. With my belly looking like a road kill opossum on a hot day in August, I vowed to never eat peas again, no matter what dastardly consequences my father would place upon me. Death could not have been permanent enough to get that taste of mushy, green orbs out of my mouth. Ironically enough my daughter loves peas, but she has never eaten them from a can…to be continued.
2 comments:
hahahah enjoyed the pea story. at 6 years old, the pill method was pretty advanced. i was still chewing my pills back then. my solution to downing awful veggies was to watch the older kids to see how they did it. i noticed by intention or not, that they used the 'spoon full of sugar makes everything go down' method. the sugar being something enjoyable on the plate and usually that meant meat. we had plenty of meat with every meal growing up, but of course the portions were dictated by the adults, so you had to ration this veggie ammo as it were as you progressed thru the meal. to be specific, i'd take a bite of veggies, followed closely by the meat. and suddenly, no veggie was a match. sure there were some terrible flavors and/or textures, but being masked by the delicious meat made it more tolerable. the habit of saving plenty of bites of meat to finish the meal in a most pleasing and victorious way quickly ensued hahahaha. we could look over at our siblings' plates and discern whether or not they were enjoying their meal... just by the ratio of meat/veggies. sometimes as i was forlornly trudging thru a meal, a sibling would look over at my plate, and make the heartfealt, sympathetic and sad commentary: oh noooo.... your meat is losing! (the meat vs. veggie battle). it was a sort of rally cry to fight back and regain the crucial meat control. cuz we all wanted a strong finish to a triumphant clean plate victory! sometimes even, my older siblings would see my feeble attempt at meat rationing, especially with certain advanced veggies that were well beyond a little kid's simple palette, and feeling sorry, they would take meat off their plate and offer it to my dwindling or decimated meat army. how sweet. sometimes there would be 2-3-4 meat replenishments just to get through a meal. funny but to this day i still do this, and i like my last bites to be meat.
OMG! You and Jeff must have had the same experience. He HATES peas - - he can smell them from a mile away. If someone makes 7 layer salad, he meets them at the door to make sure that they left off the one "layer" - the peas. If you didn't, you catch crap the rest of the holiday. And he used the milk dousing trick too, going thru an entire gallon of milk each meal!!! We were sure he ate raw cookie dough and got worms!!! haha!!!
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