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This happened in my town today.
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Common Foods: And Their Unmodified Wild Counterparts
Many fruits and vegetables as we know them today are heavily genetically modified by centuries of human intervention to make them more tasty, plentiful in edible portions, resilient to conditions, and just plain better looking. Here are several delicious fruits and vegetables pictured with their wild, original forms:
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Touch of Light by Olaf Schmidtke
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Dreaming of Spring (by Milamai)
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Otter
For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to be an otter. When I was six, Mom brought me to the Maritime Center in Norwalk. It was my birthday. Things had been really difficult for us since Dad died the year before. Mom worked long hours and I spent so much time in day care. For a while, it felt like everything was falling apart. But Mom knew I was having a hard time. She did her best to let me know I was loved. And on my sixth birthday, I truly realized how much.
Mom knew how much I adored otters. I had pictures of them from National Geographic hung up all around my room. This one was the best. I had little stuffed otter toys, too, like Ollie here. They made me feel safe and happy. But until then, I’d only seen otters on television and in magazines. When Mom surprised me with a trip to the Maritime Center, I started crying. We walked through the halls, bypassing all the aquariums featuring stingrays and jellyfish and giant lobsters. After what felt like an eternity, we made it to their glass-walled habitat.
I stood, transfixed, and watched their sleek, furry bodies navigate their enclosure. It’d been designed to look like the local estuary from which they came. I marvelled at how quickly they could dart across solid ground and dive into the water where they’d move with equal speed and grace. Then, as I watched, I finally saw it. Two otters, tired from playing around, floated together in the water. I shook with anticipation, praying I’d get to witness what I’d dreamed about. The otter on the right held out its left paw. The left otter held out its right. Then they clasped them together in a gesture of closeness while they peacefully floated.
While I watched the beautiful display, I felt a soft hand wrap around my own. It was mom. She looked down at me and smiled her warm, loving smile. We stayed that way for a long time.
Looking back, that was the best moment of my life. The decades that followed were nothing but heartbreak. Mom passed away when I was 14. Cancer. We had no other family, so I was put in foster care. My foster parents were kind, but distant. They didn’t try to understand me. I know they thought I was weird. I guess maybe I was. A teenage boy with a love of otters and no friends doesn’t sound normal. Because of that abnormality, I started getting picked on at school.
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