Thursday July 22 1515

Interesting thing I realized the other day: I have a strong mental association between death and the taste of green apples. It's true: although I absolutely love the sour taste of a good Granny Smith, it has always had a note of forlorn-ness to it when I bite into one. It's not been debilitating to my apple-preferences, but I've never been able to place exactly *why* until the other day.

Well, I was chilling out in my room after work on my laptop and I accidentally knocked Tigris off the bed (yes, of course he's here! it's the year of the Tiger...) and so I picked him up. I was sipping on an apple juice, and I got hit by a memory from deep childhood.

I remember being at the house in Renton in the livingroom: the room was generally 'brown' with wooden furniture and some paneling, and a kind of coffee-beige carpet. I think I was playing Megaman 5 trying to beat Gyroman, when Dad came out from the hallway (it led out of the livingroom and was the primary corridor where all the other rooms branched off, I think he was coming from the Library room, although I don't remember if the library door's handle was Pre- or Post-dad-escaping-to-rescue-me-from-a-bee-sting). I had just sat back down to play after pausing so I could get a green apple out from the kitchen, but I hadn't started to eat it when Dad said something along the lines of 'Hey Eddy, can I talk to you a minute?'. Dad seemed sad, so I decided to let Tigris hold onto my apple so I could talk to Dad.

Dad asked me if I remembered his grandma, and I already figured that Bad News was imminent, so I said yes, even though I didn't really recall her right away: I was still a bit too young I think. Dad talked about her peanut butter cookies, and I *did* remember liking those, so I felt a bit more encouraged. Dad, with what I perceived as a flair for the melodramatic, then told me that she had passed away, and that there could be no more such cookies. It was a very sad moment, and I started to bawl: no more delicious unique great-grandma peanut-butter cookies!

He offered some words of consolation, but I mostly wanted to just stop crying, and so I recall soon returning back to the TV, giving a sad nod to Tigris as he gave me my apple back, then taking a big, giant bite out of the still-refrigerated granny smith apple.

So yeah, I thought it was cool at least to remember something so far back. It's not my oldest memory (I remember some odd tidbits from Hawaii), but it may be one of the earliest of Renton, which I generally consider as the site of my 'childhood', since I generally see myself as a grown-up by the time I lived in Colorado.