So I recently saw Wicked, where, during what was probably a fairly decent night of passion, one of the early characters gets seduced by a traveling salesman, and he offers her what looks like a melted green Otter Pop. She drinks it, and later gives birth to an electric green baby named Elphaba, who eventually becomes the Wicked Witch of the West.
After reflecting on this musical for the past month, and listening to the soundtrack about 400 times, I'm still a little freaked out by the whole thing. I mean, every woman who has seen the show and witnessed the birthing scene where this kelly green newborn is hoisted into the air -- like the Lion King gone terribly wrong -- probably thought to herself, Man, I am so glad my baby's not the color of the Brazilian flag.
Since I've seen the show, each morning when my kids creep into my bedroom, I take a deep breath before opening my eyes, praying that they'll look relatively the same as they did when they went to bed the night before. Not that I wouldn't love them if they suddenly morphed into Elphaba, because I totally would, especially if they sang me Broadway show-tunes while I did boring things, like cleaned the toothbrush holders or folded the fitted sheets. I really don't like folding fitted sheets, and between you and me, I'm pretty bad at it, and generally give up halfway through and scrunch them into a ball.
So, between not sleeping well, worrying about my children's complexion, and scrunching fitted sheets, I've been in something of a delicate state. Then, all of a sudden, I came across this purple cauliflower at the market. I've definitely seen purple cauliflower before, but this particular one was so brightly colored it was just kind of ridiculous. I brought it home mostly to keep an eye on it. As a responsible citizen, there's no way I could just leave that thing loose in the neighborhood.
Earlier today, I ate it, then ran to the mirror.
So far, so good.
But tomorrow morning, when my kids creep into my room, will they find me?
Or Barney?
