Carrots for lunch

I put carrots in my lunch today, and as I pulled them out of my bag, I had a funny memory from kindergarten. I didn't realize I could remember that far back.

My mom taught us to pack our own lunch boxes probably in preschool, and she monitored it for a few years til she trusted we wouldn't take just junk when she wasn't watching (don't worry, we still tried). We had a couple of rules, which I loved, still automatically adhere to, and will insist that my kids follow: no more than two packaged things and no junk if there wasn't something healthy to balance it out. We fell into this routine pattern for our lunches: a sandwich, a juice box (that was one packaged thing, we were allowed to take water bottles), an apple or some carrots, some crackers, and whatever packaged cookies/cakes/junk we'd asked my mom for that week, filling out packaged-thing quota. I remember always having a hard time with the healthy stuff. I hated fruits and vegetables. But I knew I couldn't take whatever unhealthy thing I really wanted if I didn't take carrots. And for some reason, I always took carrots. I hated carrots. But I took them. Mom never said anything about what we actually had to eat, just what we had to take, but I wasn't dumb. I knew better than to come home with just my carrots. There was something that told me it wasn't okay to just throw them away either. I always tried to eat one, and was quickly reminded of my dislike for them. So my little kindergarten brain decided that if my carrots got dirty, I could throw them away, guilt-free. I put the carrots on the edge of the cafeteria table and slammed my fist down so that it shook the table, and the carrots started to roll off onto the floor. I hit the table enough times so that each of my carrots rolled off onto the ground, contaminating them enough to merit throwing them in the garbage can. And never felt like it would bother my mom.

So as I finished my carrots for lunch today (by eating them, not by pounding my desk), I really wanted to text her and say, "I ate all my carrots!" just because she would get a kick out of it. But she still doesn't know the story. It wouldn't make any sense to her.

But I'm curious what she'll come up with.