Read Online I Want My Epidural Back by Karen Alpert - Free Book Online Page B

was a green bean

    ME: Guys, don’t forget to eat your green beans. You haven’t taken a single bite.

    ZOEY: Mommy, will you tell us how green beans are made?

    ME: Well, they’re not really made. They grow.

    ZOEY: Nooooo, tell us the pretend way.

    ME: Ohhh, the pretend way.
    Ugggh, seriously? I am SOOOOO sick of telling these stupid pretend food stories. So once we went to this restaurant and the food was taking a long time to come out, and my kids were all, “Wahhhh, where’s our fooood?” and I answered, “Well, it takes the chef a long time to go out and kill the pizzas,” and then they were like, “Nuh-uhhh,” and I was like, “Yuh-huhhh. The pizzas are born on a pizza farm and then they have to grow bigger and then when someone orders a pepperoni pizza, the chef has to go out to the field and find the right one and lasso it but the pizzas keep rolling away so it takes a while.”
    Anyways, my kids aren’t idiots (except when they play a stupid game like “let’s push each other on the stairs and see who gets hurt”), so they knew I was kidding but they lovvvvved my story. And now every time we’re eating (THREE F’ing times a day), they’re all, “Tell us how they make the pizzas,” or “Tell us where they get the apples,” or “Tell us where the macaroni and cheese comes from,” and I have to use my brain a lot and come up with these silly stories.
    At first, telling these stories was fun and funny and I enjoyed doing it, but now I’m like, aggghhhh, can’t you just act like normal crotchmuffins and play with the salt and pepper shakers and leave me the hell alone? All I want to do is just eat my food in peace. Is that too much to ask?!! But fine, whatever, if it’ll make you happy.

    ZOEY: Pleeeease tell us the story about the green beans.

    ME: Okay, fine, the story about the green beans.
    I repeat her words because I’m stalling and trying to come up with a creative story I haven’t told before.

    ME: So the green beans grow in big fields on the bottom of the ocean.

    ZOEY: So they’re like seaweed?

    ME: Kind of. But they’re green beans. And they grow in these big patches until this ginormous purple octopus with eight arms comes along and he uses all his arms to give the green beans a huge hug and he picks them all at once and swims upto the surface to deliver the green beans to the fishermen and while he’s swimming up with them, the green beans sing this song.

    We are the green beans, the green beans of the sea,
    We grow from the ocean floor, come and eat me . . .
    And yes, I know it’s like the stupidest song ever, but I’m making it up on the spot. Plus, while I’m singing it I’m actually thinking about which bottle of wine I’m going to open up tonight once the kiddos go to bed. Two more hours, two more hours, two more hours.
    Anyways, the song goes on for a few more lines, and as soon as I’m done singing it, Zoey has a question.

    ZOEY: Wait, are the green beans sad?

    ME: Sad? No, why?

    ZOEY: Because they’re gonna get eaten.

    Awww shit, she totally took my story and spun it and now she’s gonna refuse to eat her green beans because now they have feelings. Shit shit shit shit shit. You better fix this now.

    ME: Oh nooooo. Not at all. The green beans want to get eaten.

    ZOEY: They do?

    ME: Yup, that’s how they fulfill their life dream.

    ZOEY: Really?
    She looks doubtful.

    ME: Really. That is literally why they are born. That is their life purpose. To get eaten. The only sad green beans are the ones that are still left on the plate.
    Zoey looks down at the four sad green beans lying on her plate looking up at her. I mean no, they don’t really have eyes, but you know, I’m personifying or whatever the F that’s called.
    And the next thing I know, she’s gobbling up every green bean on her plate. By the last one,