Today was the day I had decided to eat my first tomato. When I say my first tomato, I mean my first tomato. First one ever. You’ll see why here in a minute. Tomatoes are awful, awful foods if you try them raw. In their raw form they are pervasive and soggy and slimy and juicy with deadly toxins and terribly smelly and full of deadly carcinogenic seeds (do your research!) and from the devil. Notice that I prefaced that trail of descriptives with “In their raw form.” Do not argue with me and tell me why you like tomatoes,because number one, you’re wrong and number two, I don’t care what you think about them.

I hate them.

There are some good things come from tomatoes and I am glad to offer up the mad propers where they are due. Let’s take a moment together to consider.

1. Salsa. I love you. Besides your awful jar shapes from commercial failures like Chi Chi, you are, as a food category, beautiful and incredible. You are the pregnant woman of food. (Don’t think too hard about that. Just go with it.)
2. Tomato/marinara sauce. Without you, there would be no pizza and no spaghetti. This makes me tear up at even the thought.
3. Ketchup. I can live without you, but I still have some affection and appreciation. You don’t get your own holiday, like salsa does, but you rock in your own understated way.  You are Linus in the Peanuts gang. Helper to everyone, but rarely center stage.

And there are occasionally some tomatoes found in the wild that are fascinating to behold, such as this little fella.

But mostly – MOSTLY – the tomato is bad. But today was my day to eat one, so I forged ahead. I spoke to Becky the Cheerleader (by this I mean, she was cheering me on to my task,  not that she is akin to a pom-pom-bearing girl named Gigi) as I was driving toward the grocery store. In three minutes or less, she told me many things: Get salt (didn’t have any). Stop expecting it not to be slimy. Think of it as a FRUIT. Fruits continue to ripen after you pick them. Vegetables immediately start to die once picked. Don’t wash them down with the ‘nasty aftertaste’ of Diet Mtn. Dew, because they are so juicy and good. If she’d said this line first I wouldn’t have heard another word she said. As it was, I screamed and hung up on her. Not really, but I should have. The LIES! I got other advice as well, mostly about how to choose the tomato once I found myself in the unfortunate location of standing directly in the tomato section of the Produce Department. Pick a ripe one. Wait till they’re in season.

I’ll tell you what season they are in: Foul and Disgusting. Nothing else matters.

And then I went to the park, the most logical location for a tomato tasting. My son begged me not to eat one. He is like me: easily disgusted and quick to gag. Also awesome.

Here is the conclusion of the matter, for your viewing pleasure. I ain’t puttin’ on here.

So, not to spoil it for you, but this is my first–and last–tomato.