picky

As a little kid, I hated pizza. I despised it with every particle of my being. As a matter of fact, I still do. Every birthday party I went to, my mangled little brain thought, To heck with pizza! Let’s bring lambchops! So, to every birthday party I brought lambchops. On the occasion that my mother didn’t have time to make me lambchops, I would be forced to bring popcorn chicken.

My food problems often tended to be a topic of my writing. For example, here is a third grade poem about my minor lactose intolerance and cheesticks:

Cheesestick

Lactose Intolerant

Take the pill

Get the wrapper,

Pull it down.

Pull it down, 

Take it off.

Lick my lips

Ready to attack.

Ready to attack

The mighty cheesestick.

Pull,

       Pull,

              Pull, stringy, bingy-

POP!

It’s gone 

To the land of my stomach.

Well,

Time for another cheesestick!

As well as pizza, cake was another thing I didn’t like (which now I do). When I told my friends that at birthday parties, I watched their jaw drop to the ground and their eyes widen to be size of baseballs, as if saying, YOU DON’T LIKE CAKE OR PIZZA? It was the reaction I was used to. I sighed every time, wishing somebody would understand. My best friend (I will change names for privacy purposes), Ana, did once. She was not a fan of pizza. Or cake. She now likes both.

Ana was my picky pal until about fourth grade when she started liking things I still didn’t, and I started liking things she never did. She started eating pizza and peanut butter. I felt sad looking back on the days that Ana wouldn’t collect Reeses Peanut Butter Cups every time we went trick-or-treating. She ate ketchup with her eggs (I HATE ketchup). I still don’t like pizza or peanut butter or ketchup.

But I started eating salad and other vegetables. It’s funny how the diets we are so accustomed to as small children change with every year. Fortunately, changing food we like does not change friendship. Ana and I are still best friends to this day. We actually wrote a ton of short stories together.

Food is a PICKY topic (pun intended). But it’s delicious.