I Can Name That Tune In 250 Words Or Less*

[With thanks, yet again, to TangledLou over at Periphery for the nudge in her post The Price Is Right. She asked about loss, specifically she asked what we could write in 250 words or less about "that first time you can remember feeling that sense of loss." The minute I read the prompt, this memory sprang to mind. Though it is difficult for me to articulate exactly what it was, something--maybe even more than one thing--was definitely lost in that moment.]

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To many people, a stuffed green olive--the kind we used to call Spanish olives, before we all got a lot more specific about olives--resembles a horrifically discolored eyeball, but in our house growing up, the red pimento center was the olive's tongue. I wasn't a big fan of the olive itself, but if left to my own devices, I would suck the tongues out of a little pile of olives, before ruthlessly discarding their tongueless carcasses.

Perhaps that's what I was doing the night when I was four and it occurred to me that if I stuck one of those deep red pimentos on the nail of my pinkie toe I might be able to trick my mother into believing I'd hurt myself. Regardless of the inspiration, that's exactly what I did, placing the pimento just so across my pinkie toe before running into the kitchen and yelling with an ingeniously convincing false whine in my voice, "Mom! I hurt my toe!"

She took one look and with a gasp, reached for the paper towels with lightning speed and a look of such sympathy and concern on her face that I immediately regretted my attempt at humor. Instead of triumph, I was flooded with guilt.

I had fooled my mother. A little too well.

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*The only thing worse than mixing metaphors is jumbling up gratuitous game show references so my apologies to TangledLou, Bob Barker, and whoever the hell hosted Name That Tune. (After skimming the Wikipedia entry on the show, the better question might be who the hell didn't host Name That Tune.)