You like food, right?

Do you ever remember the food that you ate at different times of your life? I’m sure you don’t, because you’re a dog and you forget instantly that you’ve eaten an entire steak. But I’m a human, so I do remember these things.

When I was in high school, I worked at Nordstrom on Michigan Avenue in Chicago. I was broke. I was a teenager who had no allowance, but a lovely part time job. The thing was, I had to feed myself at my lunch break and spending $10 on lunch every day just wasn’t an option. I remember my friend and coworker -- Ellen, you know her, you’ve humped her arm before and you repeatedly try to hump her dog, Penny -- and I used to walk to Potbelly’s and order one meatball sandwich with tomatoes added. I know it seems weird to add tomatoes to a meatball sandwich, but it was a tasty addition. We would split the sandwich and split the cost. It came to $4.22 each. Not a bad deal for two broke high school kids.

First first job out of college, I worked at JP Morgan Chase and my soul was sucked out of me on daily basis. I wore the same black stretchy, wide-leg dress pants every day. I pretended to complete my spreadsheet, but really, I would fill out a row of cells at line, say, 967, and then leave my screen scrolled to that line. Then it looked like I had done the previous 966 lines, when really I had done 7. You know, like when I’d walk into a room and you’d pretend to be softly and innocently resting your head on a shoe, when really you had just been chewing on it.

Since I was so miserable, and my pants were so stretchy, I ate one of those cobb salads from Corner Bakery nearly every day. I know you just heard the word salad and tilted your head in confusion. But the cobb salad from Corner Bakery has 780 calories in it. And bacon on it. And I’d also get an M&M cookie for dessert. I spent something like $10.80 each time I did this to myself and it felt worth it.

You know what I mean when I say it felt worth it, right? Like the time you were left alone with 2 pounds of ground beef in the car and you ate through a pound of it before your father intervened. Then you passed out for hours in an epic food coma. That kind of worth it.

After I quit working at Chase, I had some time to myself. I worked part time, I guess. I wrote content. But the best part of it was my freedom in lunch choices. When you work at home, you can do whatever you want for lunch. Grilled cheese sandwich? Yep. Frozen pizza? For sure. Ride my bike to the Thai place a mile away and have a sit down lunch special with spring rolls, pad thai, and a drink for $9.00? Of course. I remember the feeling of that. The knowing that I could get on my bike and go somewhere. Or not get on my bike and go nowhere. I wasn’t hemmed into eating options by proximity to my office.

In high school, we had off campus lunch and could go anywhere within walking distance that we could get to, eat, and get back within 45 minutes. I know what you’re thinking, Deniro, that’s a tight timeframe. You’re right. It was. It was plenty of time if you left right away, went to Allende on Lincoln Avenue, had two tacos and rice and beans and walked back to school. But if you wanted to go to McDonalds? Oof. You better jog there and take your burger to go on the way back. (Always eat your fries first if you can, cold fries are disgusting. Ok, ok, ok, I forgot who I was talking to. You eat garbage and have no preference for hot or cold food.)

What you eat and where you eat it says a lot about your freedom. I mean, look at you. You were fed delicious food throughout your short, but brilliant life and you still took advantage of every additional food opportunity available. Garbage. Unattended tacos on the dining room table. A box or three of Girl Scout Cookies. The loveseat. For you, everything could be a meal, or at least a snack. And your repercussions were mostly disappointed looks from me and perhaps some diarrhea (that I had to clean up). I’m just saying, sweet boy, that you had it made when it came to food. My life, and the life of my fellow humans, feels like it can be a series of agonizing decisions about what to eat. Which is silly. Sometimes I wish I could just eat the loveseat and call it a day.