Melissa's Place

Being a grown-up


There are some things, as a kid, we just SWORE we would NEVER be caught DEAD doing. And now that we’re grown ups, we do them without pause. It’s hard to put your finger on the exact day when this change overtook us. It’s different for each item.

We hold hands with boys. We read books without pictures. We can stay in the room for Dr. Who.

Also, we eat things we never thought we would. In fact, two foods I find I have an unhealthy passion for, are items I used to abhor.

First, there’s diet coke. I used to call it the most disgusting and pointless beverage in existence. (I was never melodramatic.) The inarguable fact is that it has no taste. It also has no nutritional value. But as I grew older and the demands on me became many and the pressure to cut calories increased, I found diet coke had the “kick” I love in the morning without the guilt. For many, coffee fills this niche in their lives, but I can’t do the coffee thing. So, I look forward to the sound the can makes when it opens and the fizzy shock of bubbles in your mouth as you swallow that first cold gulp.

And now, I’ve found that since Thanksgiving, I cannot stop thinking about pumpkin pie. I ask at restaurants and at Tim Hortons and I buy the ingredients and I lay awake at night fantasizing about the saltiness of the crust and the smooth sweetness of the filling. I even convince myself the benefits of the antioxidants (beta-carotene) warrant my steadfast fixation (if not obsession) and outweigh any detriment to my arteries and insulin levels. What happened to being a kid and thinking anything that looked like you shat it out was probably not worth eating?