Food Wars

As discussed previously in this blog, Kathleen and I have had struggles over eating habits.  The issue has been simple: she doesn't want to eat what she doesn't want to eat and I want her to eat whatever I put in front of her.

As in any war, both sides assume that one stunning, quick victory will put the other side to shame and that will be that.  Inherent in that assumption, however is that a quick, stunning victory is possible.  Anyone who has ever spent more than five minutes with a two year-old realizes that quick is not even in the vocabulary.

What Kathleen has started realizing, however, is that no matter how many battles she can choose to stage, Mom will eventually win out, because Mom has fought many food battles in her own time and has now switched sides, bringing previous expertise and experience to the fight.  And so the campaign is coming to a shuddering, sliding, slow end, as exemplified by this evening.

When presented with a vegetable timbale, Kathleen was excited.  As soon as it touched her tongue, however, her face contorted in a look of consternation and disgust.  But when her piece of strawberry jam-smeared toast was removed, she submitted to trading bites of timbale and toast until her portion was finished.  And nary a bite was spit out.  Two year-old wills were made to be broken.