Childish Clarity
Photo: iStockphoto.com
Just as I was popping a Deviled Egg into my mouth, I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was PC’s sister. Who wanted me to know that she had given permission for Poppyseed to eat a piece of bread that was in a bowl next to the green olives. She had explained to Poppyseed that it would be OK even though Poppyseed is highly allergic to green olives, and wanted me to know.
Except…
Poppyseed isn’t allergic to green olives. In fact, to the best of my knowledge, Poppyseed isn’t allergic to anything.
I pulled Miss Poppyseed into the den to talk about truth and consequences.
“But Mama, whenever I am around green olives my nose gets all stuffy. I can’t even stand looking at them,” she explained.
“Poppyseed, that is not the same thing as an allergy. Do you break out in hives? Does your throat close up? Are you in imminent danger of going into anaphylactic shock?”
“I could be. So it’s better to be safe than sorry,” she reasoned.
Hard to be too angry with her when I think back to the two little girls who politely, but firmly, explained to their Swedish host family that they couldn’t eat any fish because fish aren’t kosher.
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Frume Sarah's World 
It’s uncanny! Poppyseed has–undoubtedly without prompting– adopted the motto of one of those two little girls who refused to eat fish on the grounds that “fish are not kosher.” As Pepgiraffe noted in a recent blogpost, her motto is–indeed–“Better safe than sorry!”
A very wise motto.
oh my heavens. i think you’ve got a future lawyer on your hands….
Dear God, I hope not.
But isn’t a stuffy nose (assuming that is true) a sign of allergy? I’m siding with the plaintiff on this one:)
Aw hell, she made the symptoms up.
Creative kid…a bit melodramtic, but creative.
(Anyone know where she gets this?)
We didn’t keep kosher as a kid, but when a non-Jewish friend served me crabs (a baltimore specialty) with milk for dinner, I told them I couldn’t have milk with crabs because it wasn’t kosher. (Really it just seemed like a gross combination.)
That is really funny.
Lucky, those nice Swedes had packed peanut butter and jelly just in case.
To be fair to PS, it sounds like she thought she might have had an allergy. Or perhaps, something that is close enough to count.
Or perhaps she just doesn’t like green olives….
I’m just saying.