Hot dogs.

Trying to make up for childhood traumas with corndogs.

I don't remember how old I was, maybe six or seven. My brother, Max, was a picky eater. My parents would joke that the only thing green he was wiling to put in his mouth were the M&M's of that lustrous color. One of the few things he was willing to eat were hot dogs, either in his Kraft macaroni and cheese, or on buns.

Our lunch one warm Saturday afternoon was, in deference to my brother's palate, hot dogs.

The two hot dogs were lined up neatly on the kitchen counter, as my brother and I stood there looking up at them and salivating. My father pulled the ketchup out of the refrigerator, and picking up one of the hot dogs, carefully wrote my brother's name, Max, in careful, curlicued script on it.

"Ooh!" I squealed with delight, as my father handed the hot dog to my brother. "I want one like that!"

"Just like Max's?" my father asked.

"Yes!" I cried, impatient to get a hot dog with my name on it. "Like Max's!"

My father grinned and began to carefully spell out my name in ketchup on my hot dog. Except, when he handed it to me, I saw that it said 'Max.'

"But.." I wailed, my mouth open slightly in confusion and a slight dampness gathering around my eyes.

"It's just like your brother's! That's what you said you wanted!" My father began to laugh loudly, his face contorting and turning nearly purple as he enjoyed his own joke. My brother laughed also, between giant, greedy bites of his hot dog.

I understood then, kind of, as the tears began rolling down my chubby cheeks. I ran out of the house and into the heat of the California midday sun, slamming the screen door behind me and not stopping until I reached the roundabout at the end of the street.

There I crouched, under a yellowing oak tree, wiping the grubby tears from my face, and slowly, bite by bite, eating my soggy wiener.