Food and I have a love/hate relationship.
I love it.
It hates me.
Our relationship can be compared to the well-known story of “The Giraffe and the Food Tree.”
W-h-h-h-a-t! You’ve never heard of “The Giraffe and the Food Tree,” (the tree that bears all sorts of foods)? In that case I’ll give you the shortened version of the tale:
“The Giraffe and the Food Tree”
A giraffe trots up to the food tree, just like all generations before him had. He expected to enjoy a loaf of bread that he could see at the bottom most branch of the tree. He gobbled up the bread and ended up getting sick! A few days later he was admiring a gallon of milk a little further into the tree. Once again he got very sick. He gave it a few more days and then decided to try to reach a burger patty far into the tree. He stretched his neck up and ate the burger patty. You guessed it- he got sick.
Finally the giraffe came to the conclusion that he must be one of those rare animals that could only eat the things furthest in the tree and hardest to reach. Sure enough his theory was right. For the rest of his days he would have to struggle finding things to eat because he could only eat the gluten-free, dairy-free, red meat-free and low in fat foods.
-THE END-
And there you have it, the story of “The Giraffe and the Food Tree.” That must have resonated somewhere in your memory, right? No? Alright, I’ll admit it. I totally made up the story in order to make a parallel between the giraffe and myself (not sure why anyone would want to be compared to a giraffe but it was the only animal I could think of that could stretch up like silly putty).
You see I’m the giraffe! And everyday I struggle with my body to feel ok and make sure to eat the right things.
Because of this, I have named myself “The Queen of Lent!” Over the past few years I have given up gluten, dairy, red meats, fast food, alcohol and caffeine.
Slowly I’ve become ok with this but as a college student it often gets in the way of life. (Can you imagine being at a bar, surrounded by drunk people, and trying to get hyper off of Sprites?)
So give me this one thing: let me be the Queen of Lent.
