#AtoZBlogChallenge: C is for Cantaloupe

Have you ever kept something from someone for so long that to try to correct them after all these years would just seem a terribly moot point? Maybe a distant acquaintance always calls you by the wrong name. Maybe they incorrectly remember where you're from or what your job is. Maybe they can never remember whether or not you're vegetarian. For me - my moot point was cantaloupe.

Weekend breakfast has always been a tradition in my family. As kids we would get up early and all gather around the table to break bread (and eggs) before setting off to soccer or play practice. In college it became a way to catch up together, as the night before was spent out with friends. And after both me and my sister moved away, it was the first meal we would share during a family visit, having flown in late the previous Friday night. Breakfast was sacred.

And what did we serve every single breakfast? Eggs, toast or banana bread, bacon, sometimes potatoes, and always, always, always cantaloupe.

I could never figure it out. With so many other fruits and melons on the market, why did we always have cantaloupe? And the strange thing is, we never had cantaloupe just lying around the house. Oh no, it was bought specifically for our breakfast gatherings. 

The ugly truth of it is: I HATE CANTALOUPE. I mean I really, really hate it. I have spent years pushing it around my plate, concealing it in my napkin, hiding it's orange tinted remains under my toast - anything to avoid eating the accursed melon.

One day I shared my feelings with my sister. She stared at me, astounded. "I thought you loved cantaloupe." "I know," I grimly acquiesced. "But we, like, eat it every time you come home." 

The following morning as we sat down to breakfast Laura, my sister, ratted me out. "You know," she proclaimed, "Jenny actually hates cantaloupe!" 

In my mind, my mother screams then faints dead away. My father gasps in horror stunned by my revelation. In a single moment I have destroyed their blissful parental mirage. How could I be so heartless? Instead my Mom just laughed and said, "Why didn't you ever say anything?"

She had a point.