The God of Sweet Toaster Dumplings

For one brief and shining moment, I​​ am​​ the god of sweet toaster dumplings, and I​​ can​​ solve all the problems of the world. ​​ 

Em and I​​ have​​ the same discussion we’d always had, the same discussion we’d been having for as long as we’ve known each other. ​​​​ I call it a discussion because​​ argument​​ sounds too heated​​ and​​ fight​​ sounds catastrophic. ​​​​ The discussion never resolves a right or a wrong, or even a right or a left, and also the discussion never resolves. ​​​​ It wears down our boredom over hours of silence, hours of communication by body language, until one of us becomes​​ distracted and​​ our mind wanders to​​ unrelated hypothetical which gets us speculating wildly. ​​ At what length does a breadstick become a baguette? ​​ Is cereal a kind of soup? ​​ Is oatmeal? ​​ 

Never real eye contact, sitting on the couch​​ looking​​ off to an angle where our eyes​​ can​​ meet at a point somewhere in front of the TV,​​ or in the car where we can justify it by watching the road. ​​ Doing laundry where we focus on folding and stacking, or in the kitchen where we chop vegetables. ​​ We hear the small​​ muffled​​ sounds of the world​​ beyond​​ the room​​ we’re in.

Resolved: Pop-Tarts are dumplings.

I propose the following:

• Dumplings are dough surrounding a filling

• Dumplings need not be cooked in a particular way​​ in order to be a dumpling

  • Cf. How bagels must be boiled to be bagels.

• Dumplings need not be savory

• A​​ Pop-Tart is:

  • A fruity filling

  • Surrounded by dough

• Ergo a Pop-Tart is a sweet toaster dumpling

And we can shove the other back down into the depths where it belongs and Em and I can continue our marriage having solved another great problem and marveling at what a mystery of life we lead, and then we can move on. ​​ And there in the depths​​ the other great unsolvable​​ shall remain for a thousand years in slumber, or for about three weeks, until it bubbles back up to the surface again. ​​​​ And we can live our marriage three weeks at a time,​​ each time believing that​​ these​​ three weeks will stretch into eternity, or else we’ll die before the end of them​​ or the answer will arrive to both of us telepathically and separately and the discussion need never arise again​​ because we both understand the answer and​​ both understand that the other person understands the answer. (In this fiction whoever is doing the imagining is also imagining they are right).

I opened up​​ Wikipedia​​ to get a more concrete definition of​​ dumpling​​ to make my case,​​ And​​ there,​​ under “List of Dumplings,” under​​ P, indeed there it was: A link to the page for Pop-Tarts. ​​ We celebrated, and then we moved on for another eternity.