Get-to-Know-Jennie Week, Day 1 – Hive and Nest

If we’re going to keep being friends there are a few things you should know about me.  I wanted to do this all in one post, but the first item on my list took so long to explain that I’ve decided to spread it out over a whole week.  Talking about myself is so much easier than talking about other things!

I hate condiments.  Ketchup?  Yuck.  Mayo? Double yuck.  Mustard?  I can’t tell you how disgusting I think mustard is.  I eat my hot dogs plain.  And my sandwiches dry.  Don’t think for  a second that somehow if I only tried these things I would like them.  My mother used the same strategy when we’d eat lunch at Kmart*.  This was the only store my mother shopped at when I was growing up, and after a long day of Blue Light Specials she’d “treat” us to a bag of ham sandwiches (they came five to a bag, stacked up like bagels).  I would beg, beg, for a sandwich without mustard.  But my Mom always dismissed my request like I was asking for a sandwich plated in gold.  I was left to choke it down or go hungry.  After a few times I got wise and spent my allowance on candy, choosing a much more satisfying lunch alternative.  

I have tried to raise my children to be normal, ketchup-loving kids because not eating condiments can cause a lot of ridicule. But, people, it’s a lot like being gay. I didn’t choose to not like condiments; I was just born that way.  I’ve tried to deny my nature and eat the burger with everything on it even though I told the lady at the drive-thru that I wanted it plain.  But I can’t do it.  I just can’t go the other way.

*If you think WalMart is disgusting, you haven’t shopped at Kmart.  At least the Kmart where I grew up in Detroit.  It was in the same strip mall as a liquor store (a “party store” in Michigan parlance) and a XXX movie theatre (called, charmingly, “The Pussycat”) I remember wondering as a kid why we never went to see movies there. I mean, what little girl doesn’t want to see movies at the Pussycat Theatre? Sounded great to me.