Prunes! Prunes! Prunes!

We've tried avocados, bananas, sweet potatoes, broccoli, butternut squash, peaches, rice cereal, nectarines, green beans, pears, apples, peas, carrots, pluots, mum mums, and they were met with only scowls until...PRUNES!

It is the only food that he will routinely open up his mouth to eat.

Delight is a word that cannot possibly capture my excitement. Bliss? Rapture? Tickled pink?

And it is wrapped in with memories of a friend's mom, Pam. With every mouth full and expression of mirth, I think of Pam and how she lived her life with sheer joy. My mind drifts to memories of Pam dressed up as the Easter Bunny and hopping across the family room. (We were in college.) And her sun-like smile on her son's wedding day.

Why do prunes lead to warm fuzzies of Pam? No, she did not have issues with constipation. She was, however, the prune grand dame of Yuba City. The queen of the famed Prune Festival, now the Dried Plum Festival.

Pam left us way too soon. I wish that there were new memories to add to the old. But as Spence chows down on the prunes, I think of Pam and grin.