Backseat Conscience

About a year and a half ago, my husband stopped to get some gas at Wawa.  It was summer and a pretty hot evening.  I, as greedy as I was at the time, said, “Hey, honey, can you run in Wawa and get me a pack of Peanut Chews?”

 

My daughter, who was home for the summer warned from the backseat, “As soon as you eat that you are going to gain ten pounds.”

 

Did she really think her comment was going to stop me?  It most certainly didn’t, but she continued to be my backseat conscience.

 

My husband got back in the car and handed me a pack of Peanut Chews. My hero, I thought, smiling, as I unwrapped the package.  I quickly shoved one into my mouth,  my conscience still grumbling in the backseat, saying things like, “Mother, you have no control.  I thought you weren’t eating sweets anymore.”

 

“Oh, be quiet, ” I mumbled with my mouth twisted in pleasure.

 

My daughter gave up. My husband drove in silence, and no one was prepared for what happened a second later.

 

I felt small legs moving on the left side of my tongue!   I screamed and spat  candy all over the center console, digging frantically in my mouth, searching for tiny parts that may have been left on my tongue.

 

My husband yelled, “What?  What’s wrong?!!!”  He thought I was choking.  I am sure he thought I better be choking, spitting all over the place like a fool.

 

I am not sure what I was saying as I spat, but I called on God a few times, tears in my eyes and nauseous with disbelief.  I remember holding  my hand over my mouth and saying, “Oh my God, Jade, what is it,” as she examined the half chewed chocolate pieces and watched the creature crawl. At first she laughed so hard she couldn’t speak.  “What?!  What is it?” I asked again.

 

“Mom, it’s beetle!!!! Ah….ha….Ah…..Hahahahahahahaha…”  I have never heard her laugh so hard!  “Mom, that’s what you get for being so greedy! Ah…hahahahaaha….”

 

Now, I was thinking, my mother always told me to never eat chocolate in the summer.  I thought back to the time when I was ten-years-old and had maggots in my Clark Bar.  I couldn’t even get mad at my daughter for calling me greedy.  I rode home, in silence, with my hand over my mouth as my husband drove with one hand and wiped off the console with the other.  I told them I just needed to get home and brush my teeth.

 

I haven’t had a candy bar since that experience, and I don’t want one either. So, the next time, you think you may want a candy bar, think of me and my beetle incident.  It sure helps me think twice every time a see candy bars displayed below the front counter of CVS or in the aisle of a grocery store.  I am now my own backseat conscience.

 

Me and My Backseat Conscience ; )

 

 

 

 

For quite sometime after this incidence, my friends referred to me as Beetle Juice  : /

 I have to admit, I do kind of  like that purple shirt ; )