Oh man, you guys, if my recent experience with apples counts for anything, we are in for a world of doom. DOOM, I tell you!

I’ve got OAS. Oral Allergy Syndrome. If I eat anything from the rose family, which includes fruits such as apples, cherries, peaches, plums, pears– basically anything that’s good and tasty, my lips, tongue and throat start to tingle and itch. It’s a reaction to a surface protein, apparently, which is why I can eat things like apple pie: heat will inactivate/denature the protein.

I got this from my father. My mother’s fine. Pop? The sight of cherries makes him itchy. He hasn’t eaten these fruits in a long time. His dying wish? Well, two things: one, give him a cigarette, and two, get him two cold plums, because he hasn’t had plums in so long he can’t remember the taste of them.

A couple of years ago, I was dating this girl. She’s into the sciences and is very smart. As I named the fruits I was allergic to, she said “hmn. that’s interesting. They’re all in the same family of plants. You should look for fruits outside that family that you haven’t tried yet.”

And that got me thinking. Maybe I’m just allergic to something on the skin, etc., etc., anyway the point is this: imagine having tasted some of the most delicious fucking stuff out there. Name it: Pocky, honey, strawberries, 9-volt batteries, taters, whatever. Now imagine not being able to have any of that for 20-30 years. Years, gentlemen. And many years of deprivation to come.

Point is, it got me thinking. OAS gained traction in the recent years. Specific proteins have been identified. Surface proteins. Surface proteins… surface… proteins.

And as I passed by a fruit stand the hospital had set up to encourage healthier eating, I smelled the aroma of plums, and apples, and pears. It was irresistible, and I was longing. I had to have one. If indeed my allergy were limited to the skin, would I not be able to skin an apple and eat the rest of it, enjoy it, and live to tell about it? Is this very facility I am in not the place to have an anaphylactic reaction if I were to have one? Doesn’t that goddamn apple look so goddamn fucking wooroRRRAAAWAHGHGHHHH! I GOTTA HAVE ONE.

So I paged a colleague, and went to the physician’s lounge with my apple and a knife I borrowed from the cafeteria. My friend met me and I explained that I was going to skin the apple, and eat the apple. I was allergic to apples.
“You’re WHAT? And you’re gonna do WHAT?”
Yeah man, but it’s ok. Cuz I think it’s just OH-AY-ESS, and my girlfriend said it’s some protein on the skin.
“Are you fucking crazy? When was the last time you ate an apple?”
Like, fourth grade man. Tongue and throat got itchy. It’s ok.
“Fuck this shit. Don’t do it.”
LOOK. I’M GONNA DO IT. ARE YOU GONNA HELP ME OR NOT.
“You should get some Benadryl, Pepcid, and an Epi-pen from the pharmacy before you–”
I’M DOING IT NOW! THIS IS WHAT REAL MEN DO!

And so I took the first bite of something I hadn’t tasted in decades. It was the sweetest, juciest, most apple-like apple I’ve ever tasted. It was something that only the hottest, most sexiest and naked female form of God could make. I could taste the holy spirit. In my mind, I pictured a nude, omnipotent woman, and thought of the taste of 9-volt batteries.

I took another bite. This thing is so CRUNCHY. And pulpy. And the juice. Ohhh, god, apples. I love apples.

I finished the apple. And you know what? No fucking problem. None.

When I went home that day, I stopped by the grocery store and bought a basket of apples. All types. This color, that color, organic, non-organic. I ate apples every day. I bought a small Kershaw knife just so I could pare these apples. I named the knife “Lucille.” I carried it with me so I could eat apples whenever I wanted to. I bought a fancy bowl for my dining room just to have something to keep my apples in. Sometimes I ate three or four apples a day. No one told me what apples would do to my GI tract and bowel movements, but it’s ok. It was worth it.

Brother, let me tell you: I learned a lot about apples. There are so many varieties! Fuji, Braeburn, Gala, Honeycrisp, man– and they all taste different, and they’re all apples! I know that some are better for baking and cooking and canning and whatever, but they’re all good for munching on. Except for Granny Smiths. They taste bitter and wack. And they’re green.

Point being that we should never allow our apples to simply be labled as “Apples.” We should know what we’re eating. We should take delight in the differences between the varieties. We should take part in a healthy competition and wage Apple wars, where the strongest varieties of apples win out and take over the marketplace.

Anyway, fuck green apples. Green apples are for losers.
And don’t even get me started on “Bananas.”