Wasted Talent
Once all the noodles are gone, who really enjoys drinking the brothy part of the soup? Certainly not a younger version of myself. I can remember sitting at the kitchen table, slurping happily at my soup, eating every bit of chicken and every last noddle. I finish, with about a centimeter of polluted (rogue cracker particles and miniscule shreds of chicken) broth. I eye it, not particularly wanting to eat it, so I ask to be excused from the table (a habit of mine which has gone the way of chivalry). My mom looks into my bowl and repeats that favorite motherly adage, "There are children starving in China. Finish your soup." I cannot remember if I ate it, or sat at the table, watching it get cold, in boycott. It hardly matters now.
I was driving back to college with my mother the other day. "What you'll do with your life is still a mystery. I know whatever it is, it'll be great. You're good at English, but I still think that your thing is math. I can't help but think you'll do something with that," she says to me. I nod, wondering whether or not I should tell her I have been considering more and more going the way of the English major. I decide against it. My mother, who stopped understanding math half way through algrebra, thinks I am a mathmatical genius. I think back to the father in A Bronx Tale proudly telling his son not to "waste talent," a sentiment I know my mother shares.
I realized over a bowl of soup the other day that my mother is China. My mathmatical apptitude is the broth at the bottom of the bowl.
There are children starving in China. Finish your soup.
Did I drink the broth? Perhpas it matters more than I ever thought.
I was driving back to college with my mother the other day. "What you'll do with your life is still a mystery. I know whatever it is, it'll be great. You're good at English, but I still think that your thing is math. I can't help but think you'll do something with that," she says to me. I nod, wondering whether or not I should tell her I have been considering more and more going the way of the English major. I decide against it. My mother, who stopped understanding math half way through algrebra, thinks I am a mathmatical genius. I think back to the father in A Bronx Tale proudly telling his son not to "waste talent," a sentiment I know my mother shares.
I realized over a bowl of soup the other day that my mother is China. My mathmatical apptitude is the broth at the bottom of the bowl.
There are children starving in China. Finish your soup.
Did I drink the broth? Perhpas it matters more than I ever thought.