The Great Salad Incident

I decided one day that I was going to be healthy. Not because I suddenly developed an overwhelming love for vegetables, but because my jeans had started holding meetings behind my back. Naturally, I ordered a salad.

Now, if you’ve ever ordered a restaurant salad, you know they’re basically vegetables covered in enough cheese, bacon, croutons and dressing to cancel out the vegetables entirely. It’s a comfortable lie we all agree to tell ourselves.

“This is healthy.” Yeah, sure Karen.

Halfway through my meal, I noticed a woman sitting across the restaurant staring at me. Not a quick glance, but a full-on, National Geographic-documentary stare.

Every time I looked up…there she was just gawking at me.

Finally, she got up and walked over.

I immediately started wondering if I’d somehow forgotten to brush my hair, if I had food on my face, or if one of my eyebrows had wandered off on its own.

She smiled and said, “I just have to tell you…you’re eating that salad wrong.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

Apparently, according to this complete stranger, I was supposed to mix everything together before taking a bite.

Now, I’m standing there wondering how there can possibly be rules for lettuce.

I smiled politely and thanked her for the advice because that’s what civilized people do.

Inside my head, however, an entirely different conversation was happening.

“Lady…it’s chopped vegetables, not open-heart surgery.”

She walked away looking quite pleased with herself, as though she’d just saved me from a lifetime of improper salad consumption.

I looked down at my plate. I looked at my fork. I took another bite exactly the way I had been eating it before, because if I’ve made it this far in life without someone supervising my salad, I think I’m going to be okay.

The older I get, the more convinced I am that people are born with an uncontrollable urge to tell complete strangers how they’re doing life wrong.

Apparently today that egregious error it was lettuce.

Tomorrow? Who knows.

Maybe someone will explain the correct way to drink coffee. I mean, I drink it though a straw so it really could happen.

It’s moments like this that my tolerance for humanity clocks out!