/ck/ - Food & Cooking

I grew up in small town USA. My dad was a really abusive Vietnam PTSD case.

One year when I was 6 or 7 my dad took me up to the town common for "Founder's Day" (a local public fair day, replete with carnival stands, marching bands, etc). He never used to buy anything when we went places; one year we even went to the circus and I didn't even get a soda, nevermind food or a toy. This year a founder's day he bought me a hot dog, plain, with just mustard. I immediately dropped it in the dirt. Now what a lot of other kids never understood was that when you have a mental case as a father, any misstep or any misbehaving resulted in a beating. So of course in the middle of public I stat screaming and crying in fear of what he would do to me.

He restrained himself, just grabbed me by the arm and dragged me back to the hot dog stand where the lady there, somewhat concerned, gave me another hot dog for free. I carefully lifted it to my mouth and it rolled out of the bun and landed right in the dirt in front of everyone. He immediately started hitting me while I screamed.

I just remember a state cop who was also eating a hot dog almost put his hot dog down to intervene but he just turned and looked away. My dad dragged me back to the car and we left to go back home, where I stayed in trouble for about a week.