Pickle and Parmesan Cheese Girl

Yesterday at market, an old man that bought eggs from me said, "You smell as good as you look." I must have given him the "shut the hell up" look because he apologized and said "Sorry, I'm just a dirty old man." I thanked him for being honest.

My, how we change. It's pretty crazy that I'm a soap maker considering that between the ages of 6-9, I was the stinkiest kid on the block. My two older sisters would refuse to let me sit in the TV room with them because I smelled so bad after playing outside all day.

During those three years, my summer days were filled with swimming at the pool and riding my beloved bike, Sweet Thunder. Sweet Thunder was a pink and white, Huffy dirt bike. It had a large, pink banana seat, pink and white tassels and a sign in the front that said "Sweet Thunder 20". One day, I rode Sweet Thunder to the playground and some mean older boys wrote all over the seat with black marker. I cried and cried as I drove her home. Tears flowed down my cheeks and I could hardly see the road. I don't know how but my Dad got the magic marker off the pink seat. Every time my sisters and her friends would see me riding, they yell out "Swwwwweeeeeeet Thun-dar!"

After all that riding and swimming, I'd be a hungry and thirsty little thing. During these three years(6-9) I would eat and drink some very strange things. You would think I was pregnant. My diet mostly consisted of celery, Snickers bars and pickle juice. Yes, you heard me correctly, pickle juice. I wouldn't just drink the pickle juice out of the jar, that would be too easy. I would fill my squirt gun up with pickle juice and spray it in my mouth while I was riding Sweet Thunder. Filling up the squirt gun with the pickle juice was a task itself. I would spill it all over the floor, pickling spices would roll under the table. My Mom would be furious when she'd come home and find my mess. I would smell like a pickled 7 year old. I would miss my mouth with the squirt gun so I'd have pickle juice in my hair, on my clothes, dripping down my arms. One day, I squirted the little boy next door in the eye with pickle juice. He freaked out and said I blinded him. My Mom took my squirt gun away from me that day.

The only type of shoes I'd wear during this stage of life wear Jelly shoes. Jelly shoes are not very good at keeping odors away. After a day of running, riding and playing, my feet would be sweaty. There wasn't anything to absorb the sweat. The sweat would mix with dirt and my feet would slip around in the shoes. When I'd take them off, my feet would have marks on them and they would look like dirty sausages. I'd take off my Jelly's, get a piece of celery and try to watch TV but my sisters would kick me out. They would make me take a shower because they said my Parmesan cheese smelling feet stunk up the entire room. I'd stomp off and pretend to take a shower.

A shower consisted of standing under the stream of water for one minute. No soap, no washcloth, no shampoo. I'd jump out and run back into the TV room with my celery stick. My sisters wouldn't be satisfied. "Did you wash your hair?" I'd lie and tell them I did. My hair would be a tangled mess, dripping water all over the floor. They'd call my mom into the room and would tell her I was in the shower less than three minutes. My mom would do the sniff your head check and scream, "You get back into that shower right now! Your head smells like a wet dog! Use shampoo this time!" I learned to do it right because if my Mom washed my hair, she'd scratch my scalp off with her claws.

I went a few weeks without brushing my hair at one point. I had a tangle so big in the back of my head, it looked like a rats' nest. I was afraid my mom would find it. I brushed the few strands that weren't tangled over the nest to keep it hidden. The got so large that it looked like I had a tumor growing out of the back of my head. My mom saw it and chopped my hair off. It was the best thing for me, less wet dog smelling hair to wash.

Isn't unbelievable that this pickled, wet dog head, Parmesan cheese smelling feet girl turned out to be a soap maker?