So Why Can't We?



Dear Eugene,

I am quite conscious of the nutritional content of breakfast I feed my kids.  The other two meals we take what mom serves, but breakfast is what I fix and as with everything else I plan not to fail.

Pinhead oats at least twice a week, which my son hates and for the longest time could not resist to cheat and off-load a spoonful or two to his sister's share before she sat down.  Only once did she divulge to me the long injustice she was suffering, with an ambiguous redness around one of her eye sockets.  Her usual matter-of-factness in laying bare an obvious truth renders my indignation either too late or overly dramatic, which I had still succumbed to.  There's oatmeal on the top layer of banana, I am sure my son thought of that but got lazy after a few quick wins.

Ever since they were young I'd tell my kids how the pinhead oatmeal--"steel-cut" they market it--is like a broom of fiber sweeping scum and grease, ragtag and bobtail out of the sewer of their intestines.  I am still not sure why I used the fear tactic.  Sometimes when my abdomen makes a squishing sound I'd wonder what's happening inside.  An overdue mutiny maybe, after years of abuse by the despot of desire.

It's bread and banana this morning.  The bread is so loaded with grains that it is practically granola bar.  I used the tip of my butter knife to scoop up twice-the-fruit-half-the-sugar strawberry jam, no more than two pea size, just enough to give a bit of fruity sweetness to the generous slab of all-natural peanut butter I was going to slap on presently before force closing the case as a job well done.

Then I thought about the can of Coke that my son won't be able to resist.  All it takes is one can a week to make a mockery of my daily punctilious effort.  What's the point, really?

 Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can't We?  Such is the title of the debut album by The Cranberries, a band I liked quite a bit while I was young.  My favorite though is still their sophomore No Need to Argue.

Once I was so sick of it all that I simply sent my son the title song.

Alex

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