I don’t like dragonfruit, I don’t like papaya, and I don’t like strawberries, but most of all, I hate oranges. My hatred for this stingy mess of a fruit began in the early days of my AYSO soccer career. My team of eight-year-olds appropriately named ourselves the Aggressive Blueberries for our dark purpley-blue jersey colors.
You might think the parents could stay within this blueberry theme when they brought us after-game snacks, but you would be sorely mistaken. Our after-game snacks, like every other youth soccer team’s across America, were whatever orange-colored citrus the parent volunteers could get their hands on. Cuties, tangerines, oranges, kumquats; you name it, we ate it all. Reflecting on this seven years later, I wish the parents had been more creative. It was Silver Lake, after all; a $10 carrot juice from Erewhon would have sufficed, but we were instead subject to the sticky mass of sliced citrus in a tupperware container.
But I digress. My journey from innocent orange eater to active orange hater starts with AYSO, but extends up until this very moment, and includes many orange catastrophes along the way.
In elementary school, administration allotted 30 minutes for eating and 20 for playing. We couldn’t begin our handball endeavours until the 30 minutes were up, so this left 50 restless fifth graders with nothing to do for about 15 minutes. Naturally, I decided I would pass this time peeling my friends’ oranges for them. This sometimes became a heated competition in which we raced to see who could peel oranges in one go the fastest.
As time went on, I got better and better at digging my grubby fingers into the peel of the orange, but I soon became obsessive about crafting the perfectly naked orange. At one point I even brought tweezers to school so I could pick off every last string of peel.
Things went downhill from here. I could never look at an orange the same way. The peeling process was 30 minutes long, and when I was finished, I was left with a sweaty, marred fruit.
I’m not a dog: I refuse to sit before I eat my food. Oranges hold the same concept as a bowl of crispy kibble; why work for fruit like oranges when you could whip out a honeycrisp apple. The whole thing is over in three minutes.
Say it with me: If your food’s got a peel, you ain’t got a meal.
You might think the parents could stay within this blueberry theme when they brought us after-game snacks, but you would be sorely mistaken. Our after-game snacks, like every other youth soccer team’s across America, were whatever orange-colored citrus the parent volunteers could get their hands on. Cuties, tangerines, oranges, kumquats; you name it, we ate it all. Reflecting on this seven years later, I wish the parents had been more creative. It was Silver Lake, after all; a $10 carrot juice from Erewhon would have sufficed, but we were instead subject to the sticky mass of sliced citrus in a tupperware container.
But I digress. My journey from innocent orange eater to active orange hater starts with AYSO, but extends up until this very moment, and includes many orange catastrophes along the way.
In elementary school, administration allotted 30 minutes for eating and 20 for playing. We couldn’t begin our handball endeavours until the 30 minutes were up, so this left 50 restless fifth graders with nothing to do for about 15 minutes. Naturally, I decided I would pass this time peeling my friends’ oranges for them. This sometimes became a heated competition in which we raced to see who could peel oranges in one go the fastest.
As time went on, I got better and better at digging my grubby fingers into the peel of the orange, but I soon became obsessive about crafting the perfectly naked orange. At one point I even brought tweezers to school so I could pick off every last string of peel.
Things went downhill from here. I could never look at an orange the same way. The peeling process was 30 minutes long, and when I was finished, I was left with a sweaty, marred fruit.
I’m not a dog: I refuse to sit before I eat my food. Oranges hold the same concept as a bowl of crispy kibble; why work for fruit like oranges when you could whip out a honeycrisp apple. The whole thing is over in three minutes.
Say it with me: If your food’s got a peel, you ain’t got a meal.