Rotten Bananas

They wandered through town, tan-skinned misfits hungry to get out of the cold embrace of the house, searching for sunlight in all the wrong places. They strolled through the toughened streets of East Dallas, with their mongrel appearance and the half kind of luck that only young boys seem to possess. After being chased by a pack of wolverines, (they were really only two scruffy mutts searching for scraps to eat), this pack of lost boys wandered into the corner store, in search of something to humble their bellies. The owner eyed them as they flooded the back of his store with cat calls and the popping of stale chewing gum. They figured they'd try their luck: "Hey, mister, can we have some of these bananas?" And to their surprise: "You can have all the bananas you want, boys." Because these bananas were a dark brown, and soft to the touch. Rotten. But the boys hooted, grabbing handfuls, and from then on, amidst their adventures, stumbled in and picked those bananas up with pride. Years later, my father would try and tell me stories from his version of a poor and dust-filled Neverland. But it wasn't until recently that I began to understand what he meant when he said, "Those rotten bananas were the best I've ever had."