Feed Me

A haiku, by Leah, if you ignore the basic syllable structure that defines haikus.

Food is love
Food is life
Food is not meant to be shared

I take food very seriously. My grocery shopping is methodical and intentional. My restaurant orders are calculated and premeditated. Delivery is not a chance opportunity, but rather, a willful choice. My food is not to be fucked with unless you have a certain death wish. I can have a fork in your aorta faster than that mozzarella stick makes it to your lips.

As we have clearly established, I basically hate 100% of everything. I really, very much, sincerely loathe when any one attempts, or even suggests, that my food become their food. You had your chance and you chose poorly, now you must live with your decision. I will not fall victim to your questionable judgement, this is a fate you must accept and a journey you take alone...from across the table...with the waiter to bear witness.

My vehement reservations regarding food sharing isn't just me reverting to primal instincts, it is the result of cause and effect, trial and error, learning from my mistakes.

I can vividly recall a handful of occasions where I have offered a portion of my food to a second party. Unfortunately, that other party did not have the same respect for the food that I did and so carelessly wasted whatever morsels were left. For example, imagine someone asks to try a slice of your pizza. It is delightful pizza that is perfect in every way: crisp crust, salty cheese, acidic sauce, evenly distributed toppings. Everything about it is perfect. It is the Jesus of pizzas. Your friend excitedly takes a bite but reels back in disgust at your choice of black olives and mushrooms. They forcefully swallow the bite and proceed to drop the remaining slice on the plate like some sort of disgusting peasant in the pizza feudal system. Their blatant revulsion to your pizza taints the rest of the slice and you, the champion of its triangular perfection, are unable to take back that which was once freely given. It is like the first time you can detect in your parents' eyes how much they actually hate your finger paintings. Your heart, and stomach, slowly shatter. Sure, it may be dramatic, but you all know exactly what I am talking about.

There are also the times that you encounter The Taker. The Taker does just that, takes. She doesn't ask, suggest, propose. She grabs, generally nonchalantly, from your unexacting plate. Sometimes it is just a single fry, other times it is a bite of cheesecake. Either way, it is unforgivable and barbaric. Sometimes the individual will even have the audacity to continue to look you in the eyes and consume the kidnapped nutrients. It takes every ounce of self-control for me to not reach across the table and slam their head into the table with relentless vigor and enthusiasm.

Finally, there are The Sneaks. The Sneaks find their natural habitat in your home. Their behavior is simply impossible within the confines of a restaurant or other dining establishment. Your delightful personality has put these individuals so at ease that they feel entitled to whatever you may have in your refrigerator, cupboards, or pantry. I once observed an individual drink an entire half gallon of orange juice while hanging out in my residence. How is that deemed as acceptable behavior? Food costs money and fuck off if you think my grocery shopping is done with you in mind. The Sneaks also have the habit of breaking in to otherwise untouched or unopened food. That hunk of smoked gouda from Trader Joes that I treated myself to after a particularly miserable week at work? Go ahead, asshole, break off an ounce before I have even had the chance to pretend I was going to eat it with fancy wine and crackers instead of Wheat Thins and iced tea. Personally, The Sneaks are the worst type of people. They are the most clueless, reckless, and crude of the whole bunch. I hope they all get salmonella and violent diarrhea at the same time and can't think fast enough about which end gets the toilet and which gets the trash can.

If you steal food, you are a bad person.

Leave Leah Alone

Sometimes (all the time) I get really riled up about the 1 billion things that piss me off on a regular basis. It is like my life is the Truman Show, but instead of watching me progress through my existence as normal, everyone attempts to push me as close to violent rage as possible to see if I will actually be compelled to murder.

Before I go any deeper I find it absolutely vital that I qualify what I consider to be the measurement of my patience. In all honesty, I am not an angry person. Very rarely do I find myself miffed or Hulk-smash pissed. Usually if I am angry I am in a mess of rage-tears because I can't control my emotions and everyone sucks. It genuinely takes a lot to send me over the edge. That said, I am almost always irritated. Without a smidge of hyperbole, my resting state is generally somewhere between, "wow, you are fucking insufferable" to "natural selection missed you and that disappoints me." I wouldn't dare say this is a bad thing as it provides me with a source of witty, albeit wicked, commentary and a solid reason to never socialize with anyone out of a sense of "obligation." Side note: I hate the idea of obligation. I'm not obligated to do jack shit so fuck right off. Anyway, I am just in a constant element of wondering why the decision making skills of everyone around me leaves so much to be desired and why I, of all people, was burdened with bearing witness. 

The most broad category of that which tests my ability to remain willfully non-violent is the infinite arena of stupid questions. Any person who ever said "there is no such thing as a stupid question" is the reason the phrase was created. I can, without the slightest degree of hesitation, assure you that there are such things as stupid questions. In fact, I would even argue that stupid questions are notably more common than questions that are worth their weight in expression and contemplation. 

Before asking me a question, consider the following: is this information readily available elsewhere, perhaps Google, the biggest search engine humanity has ever seen? Have I already provided the answer to this question? Do you actually need an answer to this question or is this your piss poor attempt at small talk? Is someone currently on fire? Will someone be on fire in the near future? Are you on fire?  

If you answered "yes" to any of these questions then your social and emergency response skills are severely stunted and you should not, in fact, ask me the question. 

Similar to questions, there is small talk. Good god I fucking hate small talk. I do not care about the weather. I do not care about your hell spawn. I don't care about what you did over the weekend. I don't care about your plans to sacrifice virgins. I don't care about your current state of indigestion or what item from the Taco Bell dollar menu caused it. I do not care about your opinion on a highly charged social and/or political topic that you have no substantial or relevant educational background in.

What is so uncomfortable about silence? Why is it impossible to allow a standard greeting to be nothing more than a "hello?" If being within friendly proximity to another person makes you physically unable to refrain from filling the air with idle conversation that literally neither party is invested in, then you may want to reconsider your place and purpose in the social stratosphere.

Take those last two points and put them together and you have my next aggression generating behavior. I absolutely abhor when others try to reel me in to a conversation through a leading question or statement that essentially requires some sort of calculated response on my behalf. Examples of this include, but are not limited to: What are you doing on Saturday from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.? He is not on my good side after this weekend. Or, my personal favorite, a long and audible sigh that indicates frustration, disdain, and a hapless need for my validation. If you really desire some sort of interaction with me, and hopefully you don't, this is not the way to go about it. I know what you are doing and I will ignore you and make you uncomfortably rethink your methods of interaction. I will shame you without uttering a single syllable. Once again, I am under no obligation to soothe your ego or inquire about how many times your baby shit his pants this weekend. Move along and invest your efforts elsewhere. Your attempts to interact with me will be rejected, mocked, and leave you feeling like you just poured salt in a papercut you didn't know you had.