Clean Your Plate
“Oh, pity the poor glutton Whose troubles all begin In struggling on and on to turn What's out into what's in.” ― Walter de la Mare Clean your plate. Here is some bread to wipe up the gravy. There are starving Africans somewhere. I am ungrateful. I am wasting food, and African children are starving. No one wants to waste food. That is wasteful. Don't eat until you are full. Don't stop when you are not hungry. Finish it all. Clean your plate. Don't be wasteful. Africans are starving; somehow, if you don't eat everything on your plate, they will not starve. Somehow. If you don't clean your plate, you won't get dessert. Your reward for overeating food is sugar-dense you don't need but really want because it will trigger those beautiful hormones in your brain and make you feel so good. And as you finish that custard from the carton that smothers the ice cream from the container and the hydrogenated fat-laced sponge cake, your guilt is gon