Simply Irresistible

The smell of Chapstick makes me think of my dad, my brother, and their five-year battle over whether it was acceptable for Matthew to eat my father’s Chapsticks or not. My dad was vigorously opposed, Matthew for. It was just too tempting and my brother just too ornery (like the guy he was going against) to leave it alone. My father would purchase a new tube just waiting to be gently molded to his preferred angle, put it on top of the television almost but not quite out of Matt’s reach, and declare it off limits. Fat chance. As soon as my dad turned his back, that lip balm was history. My dad would raise holy hell, and the whole thing would start all over. But Matthew couldn’t help it--it’s human nature to want stuff we’re told we can’t have. Immediately. The only meat item I have desperately craved as a vegetarian is pastrami sandwiches--which I did not even eat when I was an omnivore. There’s just something about knowing I can’t have them that makes them seem almost irresistible sometimes. Dumb, but human. Scarlett’s Chapstick is gum. I have a certain kind I like and I try to keep a supply of it on hand. Babies can’t have gum (she’s heard a million times), but she goes for it like a heat-seeking missile when she thinks she can make it. In Matthew Cordell’s Trouble Gum, Ruben just can’t lay off the chewy stuff. I guess it’s pig nature, too.

http://www.amazon.com/Trouble-Gum-Matthew-Cordell/dp/0312387741

http://www.matthewcordell.com/history.html