“Are you a pickle?”
I’d only been to five houses, and this was the third person to ask that question.
“Dad, she thinks I’m a pickle.” Poor Dad. How to console an eight-year-old whom everyone thinks is pickle?
Who ever heard of a pickle with antennae anyway? (Or were they eyes?) I was obviously a Martian. I thought it was a great costume. It wore like a large felt pylon with the tip about six inches over the top of my head and the bottom ending at my knees. It was light green with dark green felt circles of various sizes stapled randomly all over. A hole on each side allowed my arms to carry a pillow case and one in the front, covered with dark green mesh, gave me fresh air and a blurry view of the dusky neighbourhood. At the tip of the head, two green pipe cleaners were affixed, each with a styrofoam ball at the end.
So it hurt my feelings to be mistaken for a pickle. Ruder still were the unimaginative grown-ups who didn’t even bother to guess.
“What are you supposed to be?”
“A Martian.”
“A Martian? You look like a pickle.”
I can’t remember what my dad said in his attempt to comfort me. I only remember the humiliation and frustration caused by being mistaken for something other than what I was trying to be. So it goes. No ones confuses me for a pickle anymore, but I am still pained when snap judgments are made are made about me. Others have perceived me as a slut, a stick-in-the-mud, a prude, a party girl, a lesbian, a know-it-all, a geek, a fool, an intellectual. Maybe I am all of these things. Maybe I am none of them. A single moment in time, presented without context, seems enough to permit a witness to judge for themselves.
If I met a Martian, I would ask what it ate for lunch. I would want to know how the Earth looked from Mars. If I met a pickle, I might ask it how it feels to be a pickle. I would ask if it was hard to breathe in brine and I would want to know if its own salty juices burned its eyes. I wouldn’t ask a Martian if it was hard to breathe in brine. The Martian might think I was insensitive or, worse, insulting.
If I met something green and spotted and I wasn’t sure what it was, I would try to resist blurting out “Pickle!” I know how it feels. I am not a pickle.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Frozen Bologna and Best Friends
I know the friends I had in grade school were true friends, because my sandwiches were not fit for trading. Anyone would be friends with the kids who had Oreos or pudding to offer.
The sandwich I ate on the last day of school was almost ten months old. Until it thawed at noon, I didn’t know if it was a bologna sandwich, peanut butter and honey or peanut butter and jam. I hate jam, but there was always a one-in-three chance that I would find it in my sandwich. I went to grade school long before peanut products were banned. I never knew any kids with peanut allergies.
To this day, my parents think themselves quite ingenious for hatching their efficient idea of preparing an entire school-year’s worth of sandwiches for four kids. They were well-intentioned working parents who just didn’t have time to organize themselves, their brood of children and lunches by 8:30 every weekday morning. Well-intentioned, but a bit daft.
My sister, two brothers and I were banned from play one dreaded Saturday each summer. Already tarnished from the cruel imprisonment on a summer day, our moods would further plummet at the sight of the kitchen table. Piled upon it were dozens of loaves of Wonder Bread, jars of peanut butter, jam, honey and mustard and stacks of bologna. It was Sandwich Making Day.
“No fair.”
“Life’s not fair.” My fingers were stained French’s yellow.
The sandwiches were placed in plastic bags. There were no Zip-Locks then. The plastic bags did little to ward off freezer burn. But into the freezer they would go, hundreds of ready-made sandwiches.
Every school day morning, my siblings and I would trek down to the basement where the big freezer lived among the spiders and take a sandwich. Please not jam, please not jam. My sad sandwich was placed in my blue Jabberjaw lunch box, along with a Wagon Wheel and an apple.
The Wagon Wheel was always gone long before the bus deposited me at school. Who could resist? When the bell signaled it was time to head for the gym to eat lunch, I knew my sandwich would be more or less thawed. The centre would still be cool, but at least I could now determine whether I had won the sandwich lottery. In my mind, peanut butter and honey was the top prize.
No one would trade with me. Who would trade anything good for a frozen sandwich or an apple? I wonder if I would have different friends today if I had had crackers or ham and cheese sandwiches in my lunch back then. Maybe. But I don’t believe they would have been as good as the ones I was able to make, and keep, with nothing more to offer than a ten-month-old sandwich.
The sandwich I ate on the last day of school was almost ten months old. Until it thawed at noon, I didn’t know if it was a bologna sandwich, peanut butter and honey or peanut butter and jam. I hate jam, but there was always a one-in-three chance that I would find it in my sandwich. I went to grade school long before peanut products were banned. I never knew any kids with peanut allergies.
To this day, my parents think themselves quite ingenious for hatching their efficient idea of preparing an entire school-year’s worth of sandwiches for four kids. They were well-intentioned working parents who just didn’t have time to organize themselves, their brood of children and lunches by 8:30 every weekday morning. Well-intentioned, but a bit daft.
My sister, two brothers and I were banned from play one dreaded Saturday each summer. Already tarnished from the cruel imprisonment on a summer day, our moods would further plummet at the sight of the kitchen table. Piled upon it were dozens of loaves of Wonder Bread, jars of peanut butter, jam, honey and mustard and stacks of bologna. It was Sandwich Making Day.
“No fair.”
“Life’s not fair.” My fingers were stained French’s yellow.
The sandwiches were placed in plastic bags. There were no Zip-Locks then. The plastic bags did little to ward off freezer burn. But into the freezer they would go, hundreds of ready-made sandwiches.
Every school day morning, my siblings and I would trek down to the basement where the big freezer lived among the spiders and take a sandwich. Please not jam, please not jam. My sad sandwich was placed in my blue Jabberjaw lunch box, along with a Wagon Wheel and an apple.
The Wagon Wheel was always gone long before the bus deposited me at school. Who could resist? When the bell signaled it was time to head for the gym to eat lunch, I knew my sandwich would be more or less thawed. The centre would still be cool, but at least I could now determine whether I had won the sandwich lottery. In my mind, peanut butter and honey was the top prize.
No one would trade with me. Who would trade anything good for a frozen sandwich or an apple? I wonder if I would have different friends today if I had had crackers or ham and cheese sandwiches in my lunch back then. Maybe. But I don’t believe they would have been as good as the ones I was able to make, and keep, with nothing more to offer than a ten-month-old sandwich.
Monday, September 14, 2009
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