Thursday, June 19, 2008

Passion Fruit

Katie, who lived for years on various forms of bread and cheese, is having the time of her life trying new foods in Australia. She reports that their salads are "not normal," their pizza is "different" and that she's intrigued by something called "custard apples."

Today she described eating a passion fruit as though she'd gone on an expedition to a distant planet. "It's hard to explain," she said. "But if you get past the fact that it looks gross and feels gross and slimy in your mouth, it's delicious."

What? "...get past...gross and slimy...."

Is this the same girl who no longer eats Caesar salads because she found out most of the dressings have anchovies, who for years would not touch anything that had ever touched a tomato, who could not abide avocados because they looked "squishy"?

True, tomatoes are now among her favorite foods and she got past the avocado phobia a year ago or so, but I'm still amazed.

I'm bracing myself for the flood of "It's hard to explain if you haven't...." and "You can't really understand...." when she gets back. My daughter has sailed into a world I've never seen, and I'm thrilled and proud. Once in a while, I feel just a tiny bit like an old toy tossed on a shelf, a relic from a dearly-loved past life.

Just a tiny bit, really. And only once in a while.

6 comments:

Go Mama said...

Yay Katie! I love that she is exploring her new world and discovering tropical fruits. We have a lot of these in California, so they're not that strange to us over here.

Here's more on the cherimoya, er, "custard apple":

http://www.melissas.com/catalog/index.cfm?info=yes&product_ID=56

And, what's not to love about ANYTHING passionfruit!!

Come to Cali one of these days and I'll hook you up Jerri!

Anonymous said...

Old toy tossed on a shelf?

Not so much, I think.

But if we've done our job correctly, we're supposed to become obsolete as parents.

Bittersweet, I know. But most of the time, I'm rather enjoying the unfolding of the next stage.

mamatulip said...

Has she had Vegemite yet?

Carrie Wilson Link said...

: )

Deb Shucka said...

Is it time to pull Velveteen Rabbit off the shelf?

Love to you.

Michelle O'Neil said...

A relic....or, the most important influential force in her life.