Mashed Potatoes

When I was a kid, about 5 or 6 years old, I choked on a chicken bone. I'm not sure how, but I did indeed manage to get a bone down my throat.

  I remember the feeling of not being able to breathe. Wanting nothing more in the world than that one breath. Only wanting to fill my lungs once. Just wanting to suck in one glorious gasp of life giving oxygen. 

Of course, the bone dislodged itself and air gushed into my unobstructed lungs. It was delicious.

 Most children would probably have an aversion to chicken after such an experience. And naturally, I did.  But that moment, after that delicious breath, I decided I wouldn't eat anything I could choke on again. So in addition to my aversion to chicken, I developed an instant aversion to almost all solid foods.

 I decided to eat mashed potatoes. And only mashed potatoes. Soft, mushy, squishy, yielding, mashed potatoes.

At first, my family was accommodating, as children do go through phases. Thus boxes and boxes of Hungry Jack Mashed Potatoes were purchased for my consumption and with the assumption that my bland, freeze-dried potato flake obsession would pass, as they say, like sands through the hour glass. 

But days turned into weeks and as weeks turned into a month, my family became less accommodating and much more frustrated. They became concerned questioning whether or not a child could live on potato alone. I was taken to the doctor. The doctor told them as long as I was eating something, there's nothing to really be concerned about. Nonetheless, I was forced to drink protein and vitamin shakes. And this was before they tasted like chocolate. Think more vanilla chalk.

  What made this most puzzling to my family was the suddenness of this all. I had not told them about choking on the chicken bone. As far as they knew I developed an extreme love of mashed potatoes over night or was perhaps trying to boost Hungry Jack stock.

  After another month or so, I did start eating other foods again. But not for the reasons my family thought. I didn't miss other foods nor did I get over my fear of choking. The "health" shakes weren't even that bad. No, the real reason was my grandfather's belt. Nothing beat the fear of choking like the fear of a large man's large leather belt.

 I never forgave him for that. He never asked for forgiveness. Really there was nothing to forgive. He never hit me, only put the fear of leather in me thus enabling me to put solid foods into my throat again.

 He died a few years ago. He was sick. It wasn't that unexpected, yet still a shock. The first thing I thought of was mashed potatoes. It was all I could think about for days. To this day, I still think of him almost every time I eat mashed potatoes, or make them or see them or when I even think about mashed potatoes. 

 And I miss him.