The Cous Cous Special
So many funny things happened at the writers conference. I highly recommend the conference, they even have a teen program that makes me wish I had been more serious about writing before the age of 20. Starting at age 29 isn’t too bad though……
There isn’t a fancy name for the way I eat, I am not a vegetarian, vegan or fruititarian, athough some would disagree on the last one. I just try to eat in moderation. I am highly allergic to soy and I don’t eat pork. Yes, you all have seen me eat more than my share of bacon on occasion, but I try. One night for dinner we were being served roasted pork with creamy mashed potatoes, buttery green beans and a lovely tomato broiled with bread crumbs on top. I had seen others ordering special dinners and since I am special too I decided to ask for a vegetarian plate. I pictured the server scraping the pork off my plate into the trash and filling the plate with a heaping double helping of heavenly mashed potatoes.
Everyone else at the table was served and they said my plate would be awhile. What? How long could it take to dump that pork and put a few extra vegetables on? When it finally came the server walked up with an apology and a small bowl of cous cous with some sort of triangle substance across the top. I, for the life of me, couldn’t figure out what the triangles were. Everyone else was eating fabulous comfort foods and I am there with a bowl of death, as it turned out. I asked the server what it was, and she didn’t know. She said she would go ask the chef if there was any soy in it. 7 minutes later she can rushing back with a hot bowl of just cous cous, thanking me for not eating it, because the triangles were some sort of soy pizza shaped thing.
I said I was sorry for being so difficult but that I wasn’t a vegetarian anyway, that I just didn’t want the pork, but could she please bring me a regular plate of what everyone else was eating? She said she would and that I wasn’t difficult. I know she was thinking I was impossible.
I learned a big lesson, that trying to be special doesn’t always come out so special. I do know that I am very special to God, even when he wants me to eat cous cous. That’s just how much he loves me!
He loves you too,
Audra
Audra Krell 