Food Fight

If you ever come to dinner at my house, beware: one of us is a known food thief. There you'll be, minding your own business, when bam! A hand comes out of nowhere and steals your hot dog. While you stand in disbelief, waiting for your grilled delight to return to your plate, this person will eat the stolen item right before your very eyes. It's true, man. I've seen it happen with my own two eyes.

Those of you who know I have a 4-year-old are probably thinking that she is the food thief. After all, children are still learning boundaries and the rules of possession and take what they want until they are old enough to know better. You'd be thinking wrong. In my house, my husband is our food thief.

OK, I'll be fair. It's only happened once. But it was such a memorable event that our friends guard their food a little more carefully when Jason's in the room.

Back when we were starving college students living away from home, a cookout was a big deal. Every summer through college my high school friends and I would reunite at "grandma's" for a feast. My friend's grandmother was a surrogate grandma for us all, and good lord, can that lady cook. My friend would man the grill and "g-ma" would put together all the sweets and sides that hungry undergrads dream about when they're back on their cafeteria meal plans. Then we would all swarm around her kitchen like lions circling a kill, filling up our plates and growling if anyone got too close to our staked claims. We were preparing for the long fast ahead.

Once while we were circling the spread, my husband snatched a hot dog right off my librarian friend's plate. Jason does stuff like that; he lives for surprise attacks, for catching people off guard with an action or comment. It's part of what makes life with him so gosh-darn fun and unpredictable. But he usually stops before he goes too far with the joke. This time, though, while we were all laughing and waiting for his big "Just jokin'!" move to put the sandwich back on said friend's plate, he proceeded to stand there and take a big ol' bite. Then eat the whole thing. While we watched, shocked. And I don't think there were too many hot dogs left for my friend to replace hers with. It caught us all unawares and from then on, we knew to guard our kills a little more closely around Jason. Chances are he wouldn't do that again, but with him...well, you just never know.

So it cracked me up last night when I learned my daughter is on to him.

Ainsley is, in general, a good eater. I can't complain, really; any kid who will choose beans and rice from Chipotle over McNuggets from McDonald's 9 times out of 10 is a kid whose palate I can appreciate. But she's easily distractable and it's not unusual for her to take, like, an hour to eat a single meal. She talks some, she sings some, she eats some. So to get her to stay focused on her food, Jason will sometimes say, "I think I'm just going to eat it," and make a move for something on her plate.

Last night in the shower, out of the clear blue, Ainsley asked, "Why does Daddy always try to eat my food?"

I told her her daddy was just joking with her because we wanted her to eat her dinner instead of playing around sometimes. But I did tell her the tale of the swiped hot dog. Partly because I was laughing at her question and thought she might want to know what was so funny, but also because I wouldn't want her to be as shocked as we were should she fall victim to frankfurter theft.

When dealing with a food thief, you just can't be too careful.