Good People

The Problem with Green Bananas

She said she couldn’t because her week was bananas. I told her I like bananas. I said I cut them up and put them in my cereal in the morning. I don’t cut up a banana every morning, though, and I told her this. Sometimes I can’t find a ripe banana. Sometimes I go to five different stores and can’t find a single ripe banana. You’d think it was a conspiracy. You’d think all the grocers, supermarkets, and bodegas have it in for me. And I won’t buy green bananas. I won’t give them the satisfaction. Green bananas are like life insurance, to my way of thinking. I’ve always been shortsighted like this, can never see myself living long enough to enjoy a green banana or collect life insurance. I mean anyone’s life insurance, not mine, of course. I know that I can’t collect on my own life insurance. I don’t think I’m anyone’s beneficiary, either. Not even my father, if he’s still alive. He disowned me years ago, but I don’t blame him for that. He had better things to do than own someone who doesn’t have the foresight to buy a green banana. It’s not like I don’t know that green bananas turn yellow in time and in theory. It’s just that I can’t believe it actually happens to real people. I’m sure if I were to buy a green banana and bring it home, it’d stay green in perpetuity. I don’t know what this says about me except that maybe I’m shortsighted or am faithless, except I’m not sure it’s true that I’m faithless. I’m sure there’s something I believe in, and if you gave me a second, I could probably come up with a whole list. My father wouldn’t be listed if he’s still alive, although I doubt he is. I never saw him as the type that’d live a long time. I probably get that from him, if I get anything at all, other than the cutting up of bananas. If he’s dead, I’m sure he died standing up and talking back because that’s how I remember him. He wouldn’t take anything off anybody and that’s another thing I get from him. This is what I told her when she said her week was bananas and before she even had a chance to reply, I said, And you’d better believe it, sister.