Reminicing

I love clemetines. So much, in fact, that I'm slightly obsessive about them. As soon as I see the shoddy looking crates at the grocery store I can't help but to buy one, no matter what. I stand there for a while, choosing the crate that will deliver the sweetest, juciest, brightest orange clemetines known to mankind. I take them home, and begin eating them in pairs and triplets. There's only two of us here, so I have to eat about six or seven a day if I have any hopes of finishing them before they rot, or shrivel into a dry, tasteless little lot.

But this isn't the obsessive part. Each time I peel a clemetine, I peel it entirely, meaning that there is no whiteness left on the entire thing. No strings, no pithy white residue. Nothing except clementine.

I remember eating oranges when I was younger, and even a teenager. My mom always offered to peel them for me and my siblings. Yes, that's right. Peel. While most mothers would get out a knife and cutting board and cut the orange into large juicy wedges in around 15 seconds, my mom would stand over the garbage, peeling every last fleck of white off of those oranges. It was a labor of love, one that I never really noticed until I was peeling my own.

It takes time to peel an orange, especially when you're peeling four of them, and you're in the middle of making a meal, people are stopping by, or any of the other general craziness that exists in a house with four young kids. But a peeled orange is so much better. It's the only way to really enjoy it, without the distracting displeasure of rind and white stuff in your mouth. Just orange.

So thanks for all those countless oranges, Mom. Know that I did appreciate them, and now that I'm 2200 miles away, I miss them.

Some days I'm just a little homesick. Maybe it's more of a longing for simpler times. Someone to peel your oranges for you.

And I guess the apple really doesn't fall too far from the tree. I can only imagine that my citrus cleaning obsession will carry over to the time when we have kids. Although I know they won't appreciate it, I'll know how much better their experience is because I spent the few minutes. And maybe some day they'll know that I did it because I cared.

I know this is random, but this is why I made a new blog: So that all the random stuff can be neatly packaged in a little separate entity, and you won't have to root through it to see how we're doing. This will officially be my last apology for anything I write. Let it be known.