and the things that go up there (?)
Reader,
Today I spent an inordinate amount of time googling if the palate at the roof of my mouth was necessary for all tasting sensations. What would happen if that area was blocked off? Can I taste better if I mush food up there like a toddler with hard-ass gums for teeth?
I had caviar for the first time this month. Like good caviar. Like, the guy came to our table with a whole-ass flashlight to shine on the tiny black beads so that we could see the color differences ( I didn’t notice any), and lead us through the tasting.
Tiny white spoons were stuck in a large dish of crushed ice and small containers of caviar sat in a row.
“Take the smallest amount and press it to the roof of your mouth.”
I did as instructed. When I say I didn’t think anything could have so much flavor, that I was somehow breaking the law by eating $80-ish worth of sturgeon caviar, I mean that literally.
There were bits and bobs included with the meal:
Chips (!)
Rye toast
Capers
Hard-boiled egg yolk diced so small it was like a pile of yellow sprinkles
Onions
and butter.
Chased down with mimosas and an espresso martini, I was in heaven. A salty, buttery, briny, fishy heaven.
One of the caviars was marked “Beluga,” and I immediately thought they meant Beluga Whale. Whoever names marine life needs to come up with a better system.
I didn’t know something could be so large. (Look at that Beluga Sturgeon up top caught in 1921)
Today, mature belugas that are caught are generally 142–328 cm (4 ft 8 in — 10 ft 9 in) long and weigh 19–264 kg (42–582 lb).
I didn’t know something so small could taste like a trauma-free childhood with a good credit score.
Pushing the tiny things to the roof of my mouth, I remembered how I couldn’t taste anything the first time I tried to eat with my partial dentures. My dentist had asked me for the hundredth time if I’d like to plan for implants, and I had asked once again if we could talk about my cavities instead.
He begrudgingly started the process of scanning my mouth, its cavernous holes showing up on the high-definition screen above me, and then placed the order.
They hurt.
And I had a fucking lisp.
But worst of all, was immediately not tasting food. This coupled with the pain of removing and replacing them, I decided to let them live permanently on my bathroom counter like some strange reptile in a terrarium.
Sometimes it is the small things that have the largest impact.
L and I met on BumbleBFF, an app that has brought me one friend I communicate infrequently with, and hordes of blondes who love brunch and bravo. I love both of these things immensely, but I was seeking something else. Someone weird and nerdy and loved a dive as much as they loved a good meal.
L stomped around in vintage cowboy boots and a squirt (Estate sale finds), talked at a loud volume, laughed like the world was ending, and showed me her builds in The Sims 3 because everyone knows The Sims 3 is superior to The Sims 4.
I was fucking enchanted. Something that hasn’t happened in a while. In friendships, I always want my weird to just be seen. The moments I want to unmask and go quiet and avoid eye contact. The moments I want to talk about something deeper than watercooler talk, (if space imploded, would we feel it? Would you want to feel it?), and relax into the things that I’ve learned are hints of being on the spectrum.
It was a little thing to swipe on an app.
It was a big thing to share a king’s ransom in oysters.
I come back to “I am worth something” a lot. The phrase my therapist has beat into my thick skull session after session. “I am worth something” has turned into, “I don’t have to feel bad.”
I drink a little less. I scroll a little less. I wash my dishes while the coffee is making because it distracts me from the waiting. I workout.
But the thing is, I WANT to feel bad.
I subconsciously want to feel shame and guilt and run away from anything that says otherwise. Because if the opposite is true, if I’m just a human who is learning and adapting and letting go, where does that leave me?
I don’t know.
There have been endings I have orchestrated, and some I didn’t see coming. On the outside, change is a little thing that feels very very large.
