My Experiments With Fruit

Fruits have always occupied a place of pride in our diet since times immemorial.  So much so that many of proverbs and adages are inspired by them.  To begin with, one often hears that “the roots of perseverance may be sour, but the fruits are sweet”!!  Glossing over the fact as to which particular fruit enjoys a preferential treatment, when it comes to proverbs and adages, it came as a revelation that apple overshadowed the “king of fruits”, mango in  at least one respect.

One is immediately reminded of the famous adage, “Adam ate the apple and our teeth still ache”!  Crossing over to a more contemporary and modern period, parents have always considered children to be “apples of  their eyes”, till they prove to be a nuisance and break the hitherto existent “apple pie” order of the household.  The hapless parents can still (and do) cope up with the situation till the children are “happily married”.  More often than not, it is the marriage that proves to be the family’s “apple of discord”.  As if like a bolt from the blue, you suddenly seem to realise why our teeth still ache!!

 The prospect of going to either a dentist, or any other doctor, is always unwelcome.  Talking of toothache, I for one have always been dead scared of visiting a dentist.  So hearing the adage….”and our teeth still ache”, I developed an instant, inherent dislike for the “forbidden fruit”.  However, wishing to cut down on medical expenses and immediately being reminded of the famous – “an apple a day keeps the doctor away” proverb, I decided to give the fruit a second chance. 

Though I happen to be one of those with an apparent dislike for the fruit, the ubiquitous influence of the “forbidden fruit” was impressed upon  me by a computer whizkid friend of mine, who reminded me that these days, even a computer – “Apple” is gaining currency.  “Not only that”, he went on, “even the space programme can ill-afford to do with the fruit”.  Feigning ignorance, I asked, “are the scientists at ISRO supposed to be avowed apple eaters”??   “Don’t act like a pumpkin”, he ridiculed me.  I am talking of the Ariane Passenger Payload Experiment (APPLE)”.  The logic had clearly driven home.

Impressed by the technological and scientific strides made by the fruit, I decided to let my prejudices for once, take a backseat, as I vowed to try “keeping the doctor away”, believing religiously in the time-tested adage.

To begin with, the “fruit of my perseverance” did not appear to be as sweet as it was made out in the proverb.  Still, wishing to uphold the sagacity of my decision, I plugged on tirelessly, dreaming of the rosy prospect of not having to visit the medico, thereby ridiculing my friends whose medical bills were fattening by the day.

 However, through monthly tabs that I was keeping on the expenditure incurred in buying the fruit, it slowly dawned upon me that the fruit was not such a “rosy proposition” after all.  The steadily increasing prices of the hitherto juicy fruit now only left a bad taste in my mouth.  Slowly, it was assuming the taste of “sour grapes”.  Not only that, my newly found penchant for the fruit had completely upset my “financial applecart”. 

I clearly realised that in keeping the doctor away, I might as well end up snapping all financial links with my banker!  Well, as you all know, “an apple a day, keeps the doctor away”, but nowadays the apples are so expensive, that you might as well as prefer a doctor a day!  Therefore, earnestly believing in another time-worn adage – “don’t bite off more than you can chew”, I finally decided to call it a day, as far as “My Experiments with Fruits” were concerned.  Fearing that my friends might not make a laughing stock of me, I have instead started eating onions aplenty.  Why?  As a wag has rightly said, in contrast to an apple just keeping the doctor away, “an onion a day, keeps everybody away”!!!