I’ve been noticing this for years now, and I don’t exactly have an essay on it, but it’s an observation nonetheless. And it’ll probably be another where the intro is longer than the main point. Oh, well.
Up until this morning, my mom has actually been home when I woke up in the morning. Between her not having to be at school, or at least not until later without students there, and that I’ve been up relatively early and had no responsibilities whatsoever for the first two weeks back in the States, we’ve actually been having breakfast at roughly the same time, which is totally not normal. It also means as I stare blankly into the pantry for ten minutes as I wake up, she throws out suggestions, or actually makes the stuff that I’m too lazy to put together before 8:00am (which is anything more complicated than a Pop-Tart).
One day last week, it happened to be waffles. I went to the fridge as they were being made, and scanned for syrup. There was the real Vermont Maple from my grandparents in North Hero, and there was the glass container of the special cooking syrup (what the heck do you cook with maple syrup?). So I asked the obvious question, “Mom, do we have any syrup?”
“Yeah, there’s two bottles in there.”
“No, real syrup.”
“That is real syrup.”
I hate real syrup. When I was little I wouldn’t eat it at all. And actually, even today I wouldn’t have had her start making waffles if I knew all we had was “real” real syrup.
Much as I’m not going to attempt to break myself of my attachment to mass-produced high fructose corn syrup style syrup, of which no part has ever come from a tree, I do recognize how ridiculous it is that I’d rather have “fake” syrup than the old-fashioned stuff of which the grocery store kind is a cheap imitation.
My generation just likes high fructose corn syrup. While my parents grew up eating real maple syrup, homemade ice cream, and butter that actually came from a churn (at some point), the “real” stuff for me- what I grew up with and am used to- comes from a grocery store shelf, and before that, some factory that started with imitation ingredients and packed it full of preservatives and flavorings that are giving us all cancer.
First Methodist Church has an annual ice cream social at the homes of two couples from the church. We go down to the river and bring homemade ice cream. Just saying “homemade ice cream” makes my mouth water and I associate delicious things with the idea, probably mostly due to my parents’ appreciation for the substance. But saying its name and eating it are two different things. Five minutes outside and that delicious homemade mint chocolate chip ice cream looks like the Ooze from the Ninja Turtles. I contented myself with brownies this year and scanned the new arrivals hopefully for a quart of Bryers.
Real sugar is supposed to be sweeter than high fructose corn syrup. I can tell the difference in the flavors of Ecuadorian and North American Coca-Cola because of the one change in ingredients. And I like Ecuadorian Coke. But I’d much rather have a homegrown and cancer-infused bottle from the good ol’ U.S.A., full of stuff that will probably kill me and free of extraneous bubbles and that old-fashioned disaccharide that’s too expensive for money-bent U.S. corporations to ship to bottlers and distributors in sufficient quantities to sweeten Coke for North American consumption.
As the nostalgic, purist type, I ought to appreciate “real” stuff more. But say “burger” to my dad and me, and while he imagines grilling out in Cincinnati, Ohio, I picture a nice greasy Big Mac in a cardboard box in Anderson, South Carolina. It’s what I grew up with.
Yes, I recognize the ridiculousness of it. And yes, I’m going to go have an HFCS- and preservative-filled cancer-giving glass of root beer right now.
