Obsession

My parents lost me once. Not in a mall, or a park, or at a fair. They lost me in their backyard. I'm not scarred from this incident because I can't remember it. I was still in diapers, barely walking, and I somehow escaped. I doubt they were really worried. It was the late 70s, we were in a town of less than 2000 people (of which my dad knew 2500), and our neighborhood was fast becoming my own personal playground. Within a few years of this incident I was welcome to toddle in and out of various houses within a couple of blocks of our own home. My favorite stomping grounds became the homes of Mrs. Bossart, Calvin and Ola, and Mr. Badger. They were all older -- with kids and grandkids of their own. But I was their neighbor and cute, and I let them know it.

Naturally when my parents lost me, they started looking in these various neighbors' yards for an inevitably naked-to-the-diaper toddler. They eventually found me. I was in Mr. Badger's strawberry patch happily helping myself to the season's crop. I crossed a street to satiate my need for fresh strawberries. Soon after my parents started growing strawberries in their own garden and since I can remember I helped "pick" them. Two in the mouth, one in the bowl...that was pretty much par for the course. I remember eagerily awaiting the arrival of the first strawberry of the season which I doubt I even offered to any other of my family members.

Now I have my own strawberry patch. This year, as I checked and checked for the first ripe berry, I would bring Jaden with me. When we finally found it, I shared it with him. The obsession has been passed down a generation. He cannot get enough. He mashes them off the plant in his chubby baby hands and stuffs them in his face faster than I stop him. And really, do I want to?