 Honestly, I love Lucy, but as Desi Arnez would say, "Luuuuucy, you
got some splainin' to do!" For one thing, how do you live honestly
but still lie about your age? Perhaps only redheads can get away
with that.Even if you took the lying part out of the equation,
which may mean an early demise according to Lucy, there's still the
issue of trying to live honestly while you've got children
scampering about.
It's very difficult, and indeed, not even advisable, to tell the
truth when a 4-year-old asks why those two people on TV are sucking
on each other's faces. I suppose you could simply say they're
kissing. But unless this is your first child, you know that the next
question will be, "Why?" That one is much more difficult to explain,
especially with the added possibility of a constant stream of "whys"
after each explanation. By the end of these carefully constructed
answers to "Why?" you will have told him the intricacies of a
Caesarean section and how Uncle Larry got a vasectomy so that will
never happen again. The curious 4-year-old will then need some major
therapy.
Veteran moms know that the correct answer to "Why are they
sucking faces?" is: "I have no idea. Let's see if ‘Dora the
Explorer' is on." So much for living honestly. I'm probably going to
hell for that. At the very least, if Lucy is correct, I will have
aged like a very sharp cheddar cheese.
As for eating slowly, if Lucy had had a little practice eating
faster, she wouldn't have had to stuff all those little chocolates
into her bra when they came down the conveyor belt.
Chocolates are one of those delectable treats that I could
probably down at the rate of four per second on a good day -- even
faster if a straw came with them.
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However, Lucy said we have to eat slowly if we want to stay young. I
may be doomed, then, because eating slowly is the equivalent of
possibly starving to death in my house. And what is the point, I ask
you, of looking young while lying in a casket? "She looks so
young!"
"That's because she is."
If I don't touch something on my plate for 30 seconds, my husband
deems it fair game. Sometimes he doesn't even wait to ask, "Are you
going to eat that?"
If my dinner roll is the only one left on the table, I have to
guard it with my life. I've learned that if I hear the words "Wow!
Look over there!" my roll is in imminent danger of being roll-napped
to the other side of my kitchen table by an unscrupulous diner.
I suppose that Lucy probably looked so young because Desi never
had designs on her meal and her kids were so well-disciplined that
subterfuge was never employed to abscond with her dinner rolls. I
think perhaps staying young just isn't in the cards for me.
I take consolation in the fact that if I'm going to get old
anyway, I might as well eat as fast as I want. So, if I ever find
myself in front of a conveyor belt full of chocolates, I will not
have to stuff them into my bra to make them disappear.
[By LAURA SNYDER]
You can reach the writer at
lsnyder@lauraonlife.com
Or visit www.lauraonlife.com
for more columns and info about her books.
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