LJ Idol Week 2: "What terrifies me."
(**Warning: some gross imagery in this post, read with caution**)
I suppose, if I were to list or describe what terrifies me most, it would be a recognizable, common set of fears: death, being alone, losing my loved ones, being forgotten, etc. But people write about death and such all the time, and I don't want to get myself down. Instead, I will share with you my very greatest fear:
Shrimp.
My nemesis. Though my reactions range from calm avoidance to wide-eyed, cold-sweated terror, one thing will never change: they're going to kill me. I have run from them my whole life, but they always catch up. They are ubiquitous, ceaseless. I feel utterly alone in my struggles; many of my friends like Japan, and sushi, and therefore shrimp. It is a tough battle.
I first became aware of the horrors of shrimp when I was six years old. My parents ordered carry-out Chinese food one night; I don't recall what I ate, or the dinner at all. All I remember is waking up at 3:00am to the violent heave of vomit smacking onto my bedroom wall. I vividly recall throwing myself out of bed and tripping several times on the way around the corner to my mom's room, dripping and lurching. Another warm jet of chunks slapped against Mom's bed, and I tried to cry. I remember the hot, sour slop burning my nose, dribbling down my chest. I could hardly see anything in the dark, just vague blue forms that disappeared when my eyes involuntarily snapped shut with every spew. It hurt more than any vomit before or since. My mother jumped up and brought me an old blue plastic pitcher we used as a bucket, and went to work cleaning me up (and the floor, and her sheets and my sheets, and my wall--oh god.)
My parents have told me a hundred times how they thought I was just sick. We had Chinese food again, and I was fine; but at some point, a few weeks after the initial incident, Dad brought carry-out home that had a shrimp dish, just like the first time. I had the same reaction, and they immediately deduced that it was an allergic one.
As far as I know, I've never been tested for it or anything, but I'm fairly certain it's real. Since that first horrifying night (or at least since I was consciously aware of the link between shrimp and that horrifying night), shrimp and most other seafood smells rotten to me. It's the smell of Satan. I see a shrimp or a scallop or a lobster and I am utterly repulsed--why are you eating a giant sea bug? It has more legs than a spider. I visibly recoil, I wince, I shudder. Sometimes I gag or get nauseous.
The rest of my family loves seafood; however, they have been very considerate in accommodating me. Mom never cooked seafood at home except for occasions like my Dad's birthday (he eats SO MUCH seafood, it disgusts me), and we were always sure to seat ourselves in restaurants in such a way that I was farthest from whoever was getting seafood.
I will share one particularly dreadful moment with you. I was in Hawai'i with my family several years back, and we were getting dinner at a small Vietnamese restaurant. I love Vietnamese food, but it's one of those exotic schools of cooking that makes it difficult to identify many of the ingredients, so I've always been vigilant. I ordered something innocuous enough: noodles and pork, or something to that effect. I don't remember what my younger sister or Mom ordered, but Dad got prawn soup.
Prawn. Those are like, monster shrimp. Why would you order that?!!?
I remember being morbidly curious as to what it would look like - would it be several prawns? Would they be chopped up? Would they curl like little shrimp do? Would the smell reach my side of the table?
We received our meals. The description of what I got was vague enough for me to not call into question the soup bowl in front of me. It had noodles, after all. But what's this? That's a fatty lump of pork there in the center...
I poked it, and it turned over.
Full. Frontal. Prawn.
I stared at it with a shuddering, wild horror. I couldn't speak. I was transfixed by the disgusting, gooey, pink, veiny mass of death in front of me. I made a small sound, Dad noticed the mix up, and quickly switched our bowls. My rightful dish was a one of nice thin crispy noodles with nice thin slices of pork. But I had no appetite.
For the rest of the meal, my eyes were glazed over, and my chopsticks barely poked at my pork dish. I was no longer hungry in the slightest. I had looked Satan himself in the face, and almost ate him. From what doom I had just saved myself I did not dare imagine.
I suppose, if I were to list or describe what terrifies me most, it would be a recognizable, common set of fears: death, being alone, losing my loved ones, being forgotten, etc. But people write about death and such all the time, and I don't want to get myself down. Instead, I will share with you my very greatest fear:
Shrimp.
My nemesis. Though my reactions range from calm avoidance to wide-eyed, cold-sweated terror, one thing will never change: they're going to kill me. I have run from them my whole life, but they always catch up. They are ubiquitous, ceaseless. I feel utterly alone in my struggles; many of my friends like Japan, and sushi, and therefore shrimp. It is a tough battle.
I first became aware of the horrors of shrimp when I was six years old. My parents ordered carry-out Chinese food one night; I don't recall what I ate, or the dinner at all. All I remember is waking up at 3:00am to the violent heave of vomit smacking onto my bedroom wall. I vividly recall throwing myself out of bed and tripping several times on the way around the corner to my mom's room, dripping and lurching. Another warm jet of chunks slapped against Mom's bed, and I tried to cry. I remember the hot, sour slop burning my nose, dribbling down my chest. I could hardly see anything in the dark, just vague blue forms that disappeared when my eyes involuntarily snapped shut with every spew. It hurt more than any vomit before or since. My mother jumped up and brought me an old blue plastic pitcher we used as a bucket, and went to work cleaning me up (and the floor, and her sheets and my sheets, and my wall--oh god.)
My parents have told me a hundred times how they thought I was just sick. We had Chinese food again, and I was fine; but at some point, a few weeks after the initial incident, Dad brought carry-out home that had a shrimp dish, just like the first time. I had the same reaction, and they immediately deduced that it was an allergic one.
As far as I know, I've never been tested for it or anything, but I'm fairly certain it's real. Since that first horrifying night (or at least since I was consciously aware of the link between shrimp and that horrifying night), shrimp and most other seafood smells rotten to me. It's the smell of Satan. I see a shrimp or a scallop or a lobster and I am utterly repulsed--why are you eating a giant sea bug? It has more legs than a spider. I visibly recoil, I wince, I shudder. Sometimes I gag or get nauseous.
The rest of my family loves seafood; however, they have been very considerate in accommodating me. Mom never cooked seafood at home except for occasions like my Dad's birthday (he eats SO MUCH seafood, it disgusts me), and we were always sure to seat ourselves in restaurants in such a way that I was farthest from whoever was getting seafood.
I will share one particularly dreadful moment with you. I was in Hawai'i with my family several years back, and we were getting dinner at a small Vietnamese restaurant. I love Vietnamese food, but it's one of those exotic schools of cooking that makes it difficult to identify many of the ingredients, so I've always been vigilant. I ordered something innocuous enough: noodles and pork, or something to that effect. I don't remember what my younger sister or Mom ordered, but Dad got prawn soup.
Prawn. Those are like, monster shrimp. Why would you order that?!!?
I remember being morbidly curious as to what it would look like - would it be several prawns? Would they be chopped up? Would they curl like little shrimp do? Would the smell reach my side of the table?
We received our meals. The description of what I got was vague enough for me to not call into question the soup bowl in front of me. It had noodles, after all. But what's this? That's a fatty lump of pork there in the center...
I poked it, and it turned over.
Full. Frontal. Prawn.
I stared at it with a shuddering, wild horror. I couldn't speak. I was transfixed by the disgusting, gooey, pink, veiny mass of death in front of me. I made a small sound, Dad noticed the mix up, and quickly switched our bowls. My rightful dish was a one of nice thin crispy noodles with nice thin slices of pork. But I had no appetite.
For the rest of the meal, my eyes were glazed over, and my chopsticks barely poked at my pork dish. I was no longer hungry in the slightest. I had looked Satan himself in the face, and almost ate him. From what doom I had just saved myself I did not dare imagine.