“What is it?” my daughter asked.
Well, trying to answer that question is a bit like trying to answer: What’s the meaning of life? Why are we here? Are we alone in the universe? What’s at the center of a black hole? How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll Pop?
“Of all the great mysteries,” I replied, taking the tone of a wise, old philosopher, “this is the one man will go to his grave trying to answer.”
She stood staring at the brown, metallic-y pouches with the cryptic black writing.
“Yeah … but … it says ‘Meal, Ready To Eat.’ So, is it like food or something?”
“Yes, my dear. You nailed it: ‘Or something,’ and no one quite knows for sure what that ‘something’ is.”
By now I was cradling it, the precious MRE. Military-style rations.
I had guilted a colleague into giving me a couple. He had bought a box of them a couple years ago as hurricane supplies, and as Hurricane Dorian threatened to tip-toe into St. Augustine a week or so back, he sent out a photo of himself eating packaged spaghetti and meatballs while drinking a powdered “carbohydrate electrolyte beverage” that was a shade of blue never before seen in the natural world.
I HAD to have one.
And because they were quickly reaching their expiration date – odd considering they last for like 72 years. How long did he have these?!? – he offered to give me a couple.
The doors to Heaven itself opened up for me. Angel choirs sang and a disco ball dropped down.
Most of my childhood was spent dreaming of, working toward or eventually consuming as many MREs as my war-loving brother and I could get our hands on. You simply couldn’t play Army men in the backyard unless you had a few vacuum-packed, over-preserved, calorie-rich, gut-churning MREs. And thanks to my father, and the local Army-Navy store, we always seemed to have a fresh … er, preserved … supply.
Now I could hook a new generation on them. Look at her? My daughter was giddily rummaging through the packs as we explored their contents. Lemon-lime beverages. A dessert pack that turned out to be a Pop-Tart apparently squashed flat by a tank. Instant coffee and a packet of grape jelly that contained not only corn syrup, but also high fructose corn syrup – just for added kick. Vanilla pudding dessert powder and a packet of compressed wheat bread that had the audacity to proclaim “CELEBRATE TASTE.”
Oh, and I shall, little packet. I shall!
“So, we’re actually going to eat this?” my daughter asked.
“Of course! And you’ll never be the same … spiritually or physically. And I mean ‘physically’ because the preservatives will actually alter your DNA. But you don’t have to worry about that for like 20 years.”
We were starting with … gasp! … pork sausage patty with maple syrup and a side of hash browns with bacon!
She watched as I heated it, ripped open the piping hot bag and plopped the contents into a bowl.
Her hand slapped hard across her lips as she tried to suppress the urge to gag. A real, uncontrollable, gulp-inducing gag.
“Which is the sausage and which is the hash browns!?!” she asked, horrified.
“You know, I’m not going to lie here: I have no idea,” I said.
And then as she watched, I dug in. The price we pay for nostalgia. It was both flavorless and a kind of flavor never before seen in the natural world. In need of salt, and yet so filled with sodium that it could be chipped off.
“Is it good?” she asked, refusing a bite.
“No,” I said. “It’s actually quite awful. Which leads me to another of life’s great mysteries: Why can’t I stop eating it?” All while I could feel my DNA changing with each bite.