With All Due Respect

Angela Townsend

With all due respect, that is a chalupa. With all due respect to the venerable tradition of gift-wrapping disdain in “with all due respect,” I propose we scramble those words like the eggs in your handheld breakfast.

I have not reached forty-two frizzy years of age without splattering a few things on the linoleum. Citizens inform me that I am too loud. Professionals care enough to confirm that I should not wear neon if I don’t expect a certain reaction. At least one person possessed of a “Master of Divinity” diagnosed early symptoms of a Jezebel spirit, a purple protean thing that wriggles at the word “respect”.

Nobody respected me more than the man with the family. He gave me a piping-hot new name. He respected me enough to worry that I disliked runny eggs and did not center my words when addressing envelopes. Such things could be cured. Respect could protect me from unlawful reactions to my orange fur coat. With all due respect, I was not twenty-two anymore.

I spent Christmas Eve across from a child fracking his nostrils for stocking stuffers. I contemplated inviting him under the table with the dogs, but they wore collars. Their parents spoke of interest rates and beneficial programs. I wandered. I turned away when I saw my reflection in a beige I had not chosen. I reached for my lapel protest, my grandmother’s gaudy brooch. Santa was in ecstasy. I fumbled for a button to summon my happier ancestor.

With all due respect, I was summoned.

The family expected me to eat animals. It was good for me to outgrow a meatless youth. A life left of the center could be cooked until the edges were firm. The man promised to respect my yellow center and let it jiggle. I just had to understand that green earrings and scented markers were dangerous gifts. I just had to understand that respect was evidently not my native language. My “thoughtful” was better translated “strange”. I just had to understand that gift cards and Godiva were more respectful than tiny Big Birds and books of wet poems. I just had to hear how often I used the word “just” when defending myself. It made me sound desperate. I should be more mindful of that habit, with all due respect.

I just saw something golden under his mother’s bangs. She was not too old for watercolors. She had not worn her last sequin. I just saw how big his father’s eyes became, even now. He kept a small Ferris Wheel on a mahogany desk. He told me he giggled when he saw Gritty, the galumphing hockey mascot. I contemplated smuggling them ear-flap hats and quartz angels. I contemplated outing the nosepickers, burning the breakfast, and freeing the dogs. I contemplated inviting everyone to sing Joy to the World, as far as the curse is found.

I wore fringe on Christmas Day. I ate a mint chocolate chip and thanked Jesus for joining the soiled and the neon. The man said that was not a breakfast. I ate happy and alone. I invited Jesus to flip through cookbooks while the man dressed. Women named Aldene and Lula submitted the recipes. They rolled meatballs like spherical sacraments. They loved green granddaughters enough to use separate spoons. They used the word “zippy” with disregard for repetition.

And there you were, Maria S. from St. Louis, apologizing before preheating the oven. “I know it’s not a real chalupa.” You might have just heard the word “chalupa” for the first time. I pictured you turning it on your tongue, sparkling with the teenager across the table. “I put mozzarella on everything, and some say it just doesn’t belong. I am kind of a rebel that way! My husband says this is not a chalupa!”

With all due respect, that is a chalupa. Jesus is loud.

May the rebellion jiggle outward from the center.