THE SOPRANO SUGAR ADDICT

When I was a kid, I knew a boy who was a sugar addict.

He came from a good family — his dad climbed poles for the local gas and electric company, drove a bucket truck, earned a lot of overtime, and chewed tobacco, while his mom worked as an aide in the local primary school. His younger sister did jazz, tap, and ballet dancing and, inexplicably, wanted to be a bullfighter.

Hemingway would roar with delight as this girl Cincinnati stepped out of the path of an enraged bull, stuck a banderilla in its shoulder, and then pirouetted for all of Pamplona.

The parents had never left their small town, so they had no clue where her dream came from.

There was no history of sugar addiction on either side of the family. At that time, I don’t think any mental health professional had even considered sugar addiction as a thing. Beer and cigarettes were still a national pastime.

Stories circulated, as they always do in small towns, about how the boy had traded away an entire collection of original Star Wars action figures one at a time for chocolate milk or ice cream sandwiches at lunch with other boys at school. He had allegedly also traded his baseball mitt, a pair of prescription glasses, and hockey skates. He was unsuccessful at trading the baby carrots, sugar-free juice boxes, or baloney and cheese sandwiches his mom packed in his lunch box.