Ode to a Fork

A FORK. How did it take me this long to think of A FORK?

Peanut is a great eater. She only has four teeth, but they do a looooot of work. (She has actually given me quite a lot of hope for the culinary delights I can still experience in my older years when my teeth mostly fall out.) She eats all types of fruits and has chowed down recently on portobello mushrooms with vegetable filling, rice and beans with peppers and corn, and open faced tuna fish and pineapple sandwiches. I am shoving in everything I can while it is still easily accepted so that when we enter the chicken fingers and french fries era (translated perhaps to the fried plantains (patacones) and empanada phase), she will have a strong base of green veggies on which to pile said mounds of oil and fats.

Anyway, she eats well, but is often very invested in active participation in the eating endeavor. For months we have given her a spoon and tried to avoid overt cringing as food poured down her front or flipped down onto the floor to the delight of ant scouts sent to camp at the foot of her high chair. She has been able to get the spoon to her mouth for a while, but rarely did it manage to actually have food on it when it arrived. Until...voila!...the fork.

We actually only got a fork recently as one of her birthday presents, so there is some excuse for our not considering it as an option, but ah these past days have been magical. It is in this heart-warming, enchanting spirit that I offer you:

Ode to a Fork

Oh thou gift to me dear fork -

Food, once speared, to my mouth arrives!

Though my mother feared faint punctures to my sweet skin,

Thy pleasant tickle on my cheek merely encourages me anew.

Your zest in that dish of watermelon,

The funny way you turn my avocado into guacamole,

It brings a smile to my face to see you at work.

Grace is sometimes lacking in our efforts,

My excitement never wanes.

To you I will always turn.

What mere spoon could compete with your form and function?

On to the veggie pancakes.

Let us conquer together those grains of rice.

Yogurt may be hard,

But in the end we will triumph.