Why I hate sushi

The first time I tried sushi was in the summer of 2006. H was at a undergraduate engineering competition in California. I was at a cheap buffet in Orange County with his parents and siblings. The same parents and siblings that had been playing into some significant emotional distress for me in the past few years, the past few months, and especially in the past few weeks (all of which, sadly, would be surpassed by the emotional distress they would contribute to in the future). Some of them were eating sushi and talking about how great it was. I decided to try some because I like to try new things, and I hate to be seen as close minded, even though I was pretty sure I wouldn't like it. I tried a California roll and something else. The California roll was ok. Not great. But edible. The something else was not. So then I knew. I didn't like sushi.

I don't know when H started eating sushi. But he always liked it. It was probably sometime around then. But definitely by the time we left school and moved out of state, he definitely liked it. In 2009, when my first daughter was a few months old, we took a short trip to Montreal, Quebec, in Canada on the way to my parents' house for Thanksgiving. She was happy in her stroller while we spent the day walking around, eating good food and seeing pretty things. That evening, she needed to nurse and go to bed, so we decided to take turns staying with her while the other went out to dinner.

H let me go first.

It was exciting to be out by myself. I could go where I wanted. I didn't know where I was or where I was going, but I was excited. A woman tried to ask me for directions in French and for the first time in my life, I spoke French conversationally (no, HS and college French class conversations do NOT count). This is what I said:

"Je ne sais pas."

Which means: I don't know.

Which very accurately sums up my life at that point.

I kept walking in the light rain, and after a few blocks of wondering which little eatery I should enter, I saw a cafe on a corner. By that point I was pretty hungry and the food looked marvelous. I went in and had a fabulous dinner. Bruschetta salad and a panini sandwich on homemade bread with pumpkin seeds baked in. When I finished, I looked at the pristine rows of tiny, rainbow colored cookies lined behind the counter glass. I wanted to try ordering in French, but I was too shy. So I asked in English, "What are those?" Turns out they were macarons. "Not macaroons", he said, "Macarons." They were beautiful and looked perfect. So even though they were $2 each, I picked out a few, from the dozens of flavors the baker hastily listed off twice when I asked. I resisted the urge to eat them by myself and brought them back to our hotel room. I told H I had a surprise for dessert for after he came back from getting his dinner.

H left and while my daughter slept in the dark closet, I laid on the bed with a small light on and tried to draft a blog post for my personal blog about my experience speaking French for the first time. I knew it was meaningful. It felt meaningful. I knew I was supposed to write about it---blog about it even, but nothing worked. I mean, everything I wrote was terrible. So terrible I couldn't even pretend it wasn't. Finally I stopped pushing it and did something else.

After a long time, H came back. He had trouble finding a place to eat. It was late, so a lot of places were closed. But he finally found a Japanese buffet with a fresh sushi bar---everything made to order. He ate so much sushi. Just ate and ate and ate. Couldn't stop. It was so good.

I was so happy he had found good sushi and that even though we didn't get to eat dinner together, we both got what we wanted without having to compromise for the other. We ate the macarons together and loved them.

In the fall of 2012, H had been really busy, stressed, and depressed. We don't usually do much for each other's birthdays, but I wanted to do surprise him with something special for his birthday. Since he loves to cook, I asked a friend who went to culinary school to help teach him how to cook something new. When she suggested sushi, I knew that was perfect. He loved learning how to make it, and he has made it about once a month since then. He doesn't usually tell me when he's going to make sushi, but I can always tell when he is making it or when he has because the kitchen smells like vinegar and seaweed and steamed asparagus that is too smushy. For a long time, he kept urging me to try sushi again, hoping I would like it. A few times I did, but my reaction has never changed. Finally, he backed off.

About a year ago he made it when I had some friends over. He was supposed to be out all night, getting some work done. But he came home early and instead of going up to our room to hang out to give us space, he came down and went in the kitchen and started making sushi. One of my friends went in the kitchen to get a snack and told him how much she loved sushi and he invited her to have some. Instead of putting some on a plate and sending her on her way back out to us, he set her a place at the table and she sat and ate sushi with him. Twenty minutes later, she rejoined us girls in the living room. A couple weeks later, she spontaneously apologized to me one day. Her intent was pure, but she realized what happened was awkward and could be considered inappropriate. I told her it was no big deal, to not worry about it. But it was a big deal, and I was so thankful she apologized. I knew then that I could trust her. Unlike my husband, who never brought it up.

Last night I really needed good sleep because I've been up a lot with my girls in the mornings and during the night. So I turned on my fan for white noise and put in my ear plugs. But at 3am I woke up to my youngest daughter screaming---so loud that I was surprised how well I could hear her with my ear plugs in. I brought her into bed with me and she kept me up and my older daughter got us both up early. Finally I shooed them in the direction of their dad's room (he keeps his door shut because he leaves his window open at night because he likes to sleep in the cold) and he got up and took them downstairs so I could rest. But I couldn't rest because I'm anxious about so much right now. At 9:45, my oldest knocked at my door, wanting to see me, so I decided to go downstairs to be with my girls and eat breakfast.

As soon as I entered the living room, I was greeted by the smell of vinegar and seaweed and steamed asparagus that is too smushy wafting from the kitchen. "Are you making something?" I asked H, incredulous that he would make anything with vinegar in it so early in the morning. "Yeah, some sushi." After a few minutes, I steeled my senses and went in the kitchen to make breakfast. I needed to make my oatmeal and take it back to bed, where I could eat without my senses being assaulted from the sushi and before I snapped at my sweet but too-energetic-for-me-right-now kids.

As H tried to clean up some things to improve the smell, he got in my way. And after he got out of my way, he hovered. He knew I was on edge. The edge moved closer to me as I saw the plate of too-smushy steamed asparagus and remembered. I remembered sushi. I remembered Montreal. And I remembered last summer when he told me that it wasn't a sushi bar he went to, but a strip club.

I hurried. It felt like a race to get upstairs before I lost it all, including the contents of my stomach. He offered to help. I said no thank you. I was civil, but curt. He stood behind me and looked on. He inhaled deeply as he put something in his mouth and swallowed. I was just about to leave when I remembered something I forgot. Again he offered to help. This time I was more clear and more curt: "No thank you. I don't want anything from you right now." He said, "Okay, okay" in his best I'm-an-innocent-guy-just-tyring-to-be-nice-but-I'll-back-off-because-I-can-see-you-are-clearly-annoyed-at-something-out-of-my-control voice.

I went upstairs. I ate my breakfast. I'm trying to relax and rest. But even though I can't smell it up here, all I can think about is sushi. And how much I hate it.