.jpg) |
A fingerful of spinach.
A bite of tomato.
A nibble on a mushroom.
Then we started placing them close to one another.
Then we started piling them on TOP of one another.
Then we nonchalantly suggested different "sauces" to dip with ("...because those veggies can get pretty dry.").
And then one day I called it what it is. "Here's your milk and water, your half sandwich, your apples and strawberries, and your salad with Italian dressing."
A fleeting look of somethingorother crossed his face as he probably recalled a not-so-distant memory: a boy hero making a passionate declaration to NEVER EVER even TRY to eat a salad.
All those weird vegetables TOUCHING one another?! NEVER. EVER.
But he had a salad for lunch today: spinach, tomato, sweet peppers, carrots, with a light drizzle of Italian dressing.
Attention, World! Our kid is eating like a little human being! After years of negotiation, we managed to do this ONE THING right: we tricked our oft-irrational little food tyrant into eating a salad.
I didn't eat a salad until I was 14 and I had to put a cup of French dressing on it (the start of a decade long love affair with French dressing) so I consider him a prodigy of sorts.
I can honestly say that all that sobbing at the table was totally worth it. Grown up sobbing, naturally. Kids are strong, resilient, adaptable. They learn and change and grow and survive. Parents are slow and lumpy with mushy brains and thin skin. Parents are the ones who walk around looking more than a little shell shocked after years of trying to convince a small, demented, lovely creature that cutting his carrots into discs instead of spears does not actually change the taste in a way discernable to the Not Crazy.
But we trudge onward, the stewards of our brilliant betters. Onward, albiet little less gracefully than we'd hoped because of all the adult sobbing.
The day that he finally doesn't accuse me of trying to ruin his life with vegetables is a cause for celebration. Where's my party hat?
No comments:
Post a Comment