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mary g.'s avatar

To the Fruit on My Plate:

Yes, I realize we’ve been through this before. More than once. Apologies for being me! Apologies for not being able to hold in my head what you wish I could hold there. I know it would mean a lot to you if I could remember the very thing that makes you, you, as opposed to something else. As opposed to, say, a peach. But I cannot. I am sorry. How many times must I apologize? Need I, once again, go over my childhood with you as though you are my therapist? All right, then. I will tell you for the umpteenth time that I grew up in a house where fruit cocktail out of a can was the top of the pops, where we all hoped to be blessed with the single red cherry. Where a salad was a head of iceberg topped with mayo plus ketchup. And a vegetable—always from a can. A can! Rice was rice-a-roni. Spaghetti was always broken into bite-sized bits. Mac and Cheese was not Mac and Cheese without the bright orange powder. Must I continue? Must I remind you that I did not grow up in California? (That’s where you are from, correct?) I will try my best in the future to remember you. Apricot. You are an apricot. Yes. Not now, or ever, a peach. But I cannot predict the future.

Yours--

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