Just last weekend, after watching “A Serious Man” with my dad, I was trying to explain to him the ways in which I perceived myself as “different” as a kid (besides being Jewish). It felt really important to emphasize the sandwiches in my school lunch as an illustration. Pepperidge Farm bread and Crazy Richard’s peanut butter, when everybody else had Fluffernutter—I’ve always thought that really summed up my childhood experience.
And yes, I was really upset about the bread. And yes, I can draw out that narrative well into my adult years to explain a lot of seemingly unrelated things, like dating someone who was so clearly very wrong for me (his mother provided him with Little Debbie snack cakes, which he graciously passed on to me during study dates). Stories like this probably terrify future parents, and they also probably should. For the record, I turned out okay in spite of (and maybe even because of) the bread.
While I’m on the topic of childhood sandwich memories, I thought I’d ask my readers if any of them grew up only eating this kind of bread and constantly wondering, “Why can’t we have cool bread like everyone else at school?”
And I know I’m going to be getting a passive-aggressive call from Seana about bringing this up. She’s going to say something like, “Were you really upset about the bread?” and I’m going to be all, “No, mom. I’m not still upset about the bread, I’m just saying that I wish you had bought Wonder Bread like everyone else’s mom.” Then she’ll end the call by saying something about how everyone else’s mom didn’t care about nutrition the way she did.
Mom, the bread was fine. It’s just, whatever… you know.
