Desmond & the Lemon-substitutes.

In baking and cooking, there's what is known as a cooking substitute, which stands in place for something else you're missing. For example, some people say sour cream can be almost successfully substituted for full cream, as is the same with lemon and lime. Of course, they always swear that the finish product is good enough (or better).

I think it's the same in life. You know how life gives you lemons? I believe sometimes it gives you oranges, and you're supposed to do the same thing--make lemonade juice. Of course it'll taste nothing like the sour-ey pick-me-wake-me-up that we're used to, but it'll make a sweet greet-you-in-the-morning drink. Same principals. The finished product is good enough for fruit juice (or better, for the non-sour-toothed).

But at the end of the pulpy road... lemon isn't orange, and neither is sour cream, full cream. They were different for obvious reasons, and the finished product is never the same, even if sometimes better.

I watched my mom make a whole canteen of food today. First frying noodles, and then making mango-flavored jelly, before finally slicing up two oranges. And...? I had no big revelation. I'm just waiting for the jelly to set, before I nonchalantly ask my mom if I'm allowed to taste one. But if life does give me oranges one day, I'll just make the same puns as everyone else does, with the lemons: sell it, throw it back in Life's face, make juice, make pie, clean up the tough stains... Oranges and lemons are both citrus fruits, they should be good enough, right?I cannot help much what is given to me, or what someone else does. I can only cope, and hope that things will be better. And make the adjustments, hoping the finished product is good enough, or if I'm fortunate, better.