Not a French Fry

Growing up it was difficult to feed me. It still kinda is, because I am the pickiest eater you will ever meet. It’s easier to tell you what I do like than it is to say what I don’t like. Some might say my taste buds are dumb, but if you ask me they’re unique.

I used to enjoy all types of food, but somewhere along the way my taste buds changed. My dad said that when my mom stopped giving me as much milk my taste for different foods began to change. Many foods just started to taste different and to me they were now disgusting. Maybe my taste buds went through some type of puberty before I could even form proper sentences. Over time it has gotten better but I still have the diet of a 40-year-old fat man who sits on his couch all day eating Lays potato chips. You should see the look on people’s faces when they find out what I do and don’t eat. They look like they’ve seen a ghost, or even worse.

In elementary school I was known for my “famous lunches.” Every day it was something along the lines of those little brown, oval-shaped packs of meat we call chicken nuggets, or a skinny, red piece of pork wrapped in bread and decorated with lines of red, yellow, and green. To me those were some of the best foods on the planet. I could never get enough of grease, fat, and carbs. Everyone thought that I was crazy but with my simple, naive mind I thought my diet was perfectly normal.

Every day I would bring a plastic container with my delicious Tyson chicken nuggets, a Fruit by the Foot, and a hot dog. Someone would always ask me what I had for lunch that day and I would say, “The usual.” They would immediately know what I was talking about. I would always flick my Fruit by the Foot, so it would all unravel in one zip, and people always wanted to sit near me so they could see it. Everyone waited for the day that I would bring a new lunch, but that day wouldn’t come until we reached middle school.

Until about a couple of months ago McDonald’s was my favorite place in the world. I loved it so much that I had my first birthday party there. Those skinny, golden, and perfectly salted french fries, along with the brown, crispy, white-meat nuggets, were my favorite combination on Earth. Top it off with that delicious, milky-white, perfectly swirled ice cream and I might as well be in Heaven.

My parents and other close relatives would attempt to get me to try new foods all the time, and sometimes they would bribe me or even threaten to take away something if I did or didn’t try it. My aunt, who loves to cook, always made extra food for my family, and this is where I tried most foods. I will never forget when I was about 10 years old and I was coerced into eating smothered potatoes.

“It taste just like a french fry!” said my mom, cousin, and aunt.

Boy, was that the biggest lie ever told to me as a child. They told me it would be delicious and that I would love it. At first I didn’t believe them, but their argument became more and more convincing since they were so persistent. They ended up convincing me that it would not be that bad, even though I didn’t have much of a choice. They stuck a fork in the sliced up yellow and brown piece of potato, coated in seasoning, and handed it to me. I took a long look at it and a deep breath. I slowly moved the fork closer to my face inch by inch like the potato was possibly filled with poison and if I liked it I lived and if I didn’t that meant death.

I finally bit into it and it was time for a verdict. It took a second for the taste to resonate with me but when it did I regretted ever agreeing to this. I spit out the potato and seconds later I was throwing up on the kitchen floor. That potato was the most horrific thing I had ever tasted. I wanted to scrub the taste off of my tongue but all I could do was get something to drink. I feared that they would make me clean up my throw up, because it just seemed like something they would do, but surprisingly they didn’t. My mom ended up cleaning it up and I felt a little bad. I felt like a dog watching its owner pick up its poo. At the time I was still a little mad at them for making me try something so terrible, but as I got older I realized they were just concerned for my health. Don’t be like me and wait until the last minute to change your diet. I’m just starting to try healthier foods because I realized that many consequences will form from only eating the few foods I eat. I still don’t have the healthiest diet around but I’m working on it one step at a time.