The Search for Delicious

There is a children's book that I loved when I was a kid called "The Search for Delicious" wherein a fictional land had a fictional king who is writing a dictionary (this book was right up my alley even when I was eight; I've always loved dictionaries -- a book about words, glorious!). The beginning dictionary writing went easily enough and the king cruised through letters A,B, and C, but got stuck when he got to the letter D, and was particularly uncertain of how to define the word "delicious." (There was also a disagreement between himself and the queen as to what was "delicious.") Because no one in the king's court could decide what the most delicious thing in the world was, the dictionary could not define the word, so the king wisely sent his assistant into the countryside to search for the meaning of delicious (don't you just love that plot? I'm jealous I didn't think of it).

Gaylen, our main character, encounters many adventures, of course, and many interesting characters, of course, and experiences the evil of his uncle (uncles are always getting a bad rap in literature; they and step-parents should rally together to reform that) who is out to sabotage his quest, but eventually he finds that the most delicious thing in the world is water (some aspects of the novel are very political and certainly ahead of its time, so like many children's books it is also written for adults). And in the end, water becomes the meaning of delicious. (Why a company such as, oh say, Evian hasn't yet commercialized this tale, I don't know.)

I think of this story often when I'm running, especially in the last leg of my journey since I always become very thirsty (and my lips and teeth always seem to get this strange gumminess on them -- does this happen to anyone else?) and I start to focus on getting home just to be able to gulp down that delicious water. It's true that in this modern age of exercise that sports drinks have flooded the market and many of us reach for Gatorade instead of water after a run, but I have to say that to me, nothing tastes better than cold water after I've been running.