Tomatoes

As a young child, I despised tomatoes. Unfortunately for me, however, my entire family was very fond of them. To my parent’s dismay, I would always decline when they offered me tomatoes in a sandwich or salad. It was hard for them to believe that tomatoes would render such a positive taste in their mouths, but not in a mouth engendered by them. Thus, they made it their goal to get me to like tomatoes; they were sure that my dislike for them was a fad that would soon wear off. They resorted to putting pureed tomatoes in my salads. But I outsmarted them: I would proceed to “disinfect” each individual piece of lettuce, each individual piece of cabbage, and each individual piece of spinach, with the precision of a neurosurgeon until there was no trace of tomato left on my salad. My hatred for tomatoes slowly became an integral part of my identity. I made friends and enemies over my opinions on tomatoes. During recess, I would sit on the bench and talk about tomatoes with my friends. Soon enough, tomatoes had eclipsed all other aspects of my life. I replaced my introduction of, “Hi, I’m Kevin, and I like playing chess.” Or “Hi I’m Kevin, and I play soccer.” To “Hi, I’m Kevin. What’s your stance on tomatoes? I hate them.” Hating tomatoes was something that made me unique, not only at home, but at school. I had little sense of self identity as a 6-year-old, so I attached myself to my hatred of tomatoes to seem different, so I could have a conversation starter and so I could make friends. 

            One day, I was headed to the cafeteria for 3^rd-grade lunch. I walked over to my back pack, unzipped it, and grabbed my… I had forgotten my lunch! This was a dreaded moment, since it meant that I had to eat the cafeteria lunch—a risky lottery with a 30% chance of chicken nuggets, a 25% chance of a corn dog, a 20% chance of a soggy hamburger, a 15% chance of a stale piece of bread and a 10% chance of other, unidentifiable food. If you do the math, this means that there was an approximately 0% chance that I was going to enjoy my lunch that day. Nevertheless, I reluctantly dragged myself down to the cafeteria and got in the line for school lunch. I grabbed a plate and sat down with my cohort of tomato-hating friends (or, more accurately, my group of friends who pretended to hate tomatoes when in my presence). The lunch for the day looked like something encased in two pieces of bread, like some sort of sandwich, but not really. Dismayed enough by my situation, I didn’t bother to open the sandwich to see what was inside, but rather, began eating it. I was pleasantly surprised. Apart from the fact that the bread tasted like an expired stick of gum, the inside of the sandwich tasted quite good. Something in my mouth tasted sweet and juicy; like something I had never eaten before. I peeled back the top piece of bread to reveal what I had just eaten. I reeled in horror! I leaned over and looked closely to make sure that I had seen what I thought I had seen. It was a thick slice of tomato.

In all my years of passionately hating tomatoes, I had never considered actually trying one. I had spent all this time outwardly hating tomatoes, but I didn’t have a clue of what they tasted like. That day I fell in love with tomatoes. When I got home I told my parents to buy as many tomatoes as they could find. Now, I had developed a strong feeling for tomatoes, but on the other end of the spectrum. But this time was different. I didn’t become a tomato awareness advocator, nor did I introduce myself with “Hi I’m Kevin, and I absolutely love tomatoes.” I no longer needed tomatoes to define who I was; I was happy leaving that to myself. To this day, every time I eat a sandwich or salad I make sure to add a thick slice of my favorite fruit.