Dare: Face Your Fears (Part One)

The Challenge: Eat something you haven't dared to eat, meet someone you haven't dared to meet, and write your experiences in a poem.

Since I'm fairly fearless (at least when it comes to food and meeting people), I modified this one just a tad. I decided to eat something I hate (is abhor too strong a word? I think not!) and to meet someone that I wouldn't normally engage with.

The first part was easy as there are several foods that I really do not like. David helped me pick, and we decided on a strawberry. I have a very good, very deep psychological reason for this hatred, I promise. And in the last 15 years I've only eaten them twice. The second part was a bit harder because, although I'm an introvert, I'm not in any way shy.

We had a mini-moot of CleanPlacers on Friday, and I decided to complete the food portion of this challenge then. Kathy, a manager at Panera, was kind enough to provide me a whole strawberry. And I don't think she understood my predicament, because she found the biggest one she had!

Yes, the experience was horrible. I can now assure you all that my dislike of this popular fruit is not just from a bad experience years ago, but because the inside of a strawberry feels like grit while the outside is fuzzy. Food should not be fuzzy and gritty.

Here's the poem:

strawberry

my enemy is
vivid red with small green seeds--
I have conquered you

For the second part, I decided to make friends with some of my fellow movie goers. I got tickets to see the three Lord of the Rings movies this month, and last week I got to know the only people ahead of me in line. This week, we met again. They are Becky, her daughter, Elizabeth, and her father, Frank. It was fun to get to know them. Sadly, Becky and Frank have to miss the last movie next week! They are closest to the camera here (Becky, Elizabeth, Frank).


Becky was a great purse guard, and also has a thing for chewy Sweet Tarts. You can learn a lot about a person just hanging out together in line!

My poem:

One Ring

J.R.R. Tolkien never could
have guessed
his fabled ring had the power
to find us all, power enough
to rule us, to bring us all,
and, in the darkness
of a movie theater,
bind us.

Yet here we sit, bright eyes filled
with awestruck wonder,
ready to cheer once again


And so completes my part of this challenge (we have four other challenge takers who are doing this!)