Pizza, Something I feel strongly about

Pizza, Something I Feel Strongly About

Dave Lembke
Chelsea Public School, Grade 12

I have many strong feelings about pizza. I think it shows our American culture very accurately. Sure there are the new agers who, in a desperate attempt to be open-minded will accuse you of ignorance saying, “Pizza is Italian, people in this country are so open minded!” Whatever. An education at some liberal arts college does not give you superiority over anyone who wants to participate in the great American pastime of pizza eating. It may be true that the basic idea of pizza did come from Italy, but the basic ingredients of pizza, wheat and tomatoes, came from southwest Asia and South America, so Americans aren’t the only ones who haven’t cited their sources. Also, although I have never tried Italian pizza, I have heard that there are some big differences. American pizza has more tomato sauce, a softer crust, and a lot more fat. In other words, we have optimized a once-good thing to perfection. Thinking about it a little more deeply, I have realized that pizza is a reflection of our culture. Although America contains inhabitants who have immigrated from all different parts of the world in different time periods, it seems that they all eventually gave up their heritage and admitted that they had become part of a new group, and that they were now American. For example, I am a big mix of a bunch of different Europeans. I believe I am part Danish, part Irish, part German, and probably part of a bunch of other countries I have never heard of or possibly ones that don’t exist anymore. I feel absolutely no connection with these far-off places and I have never even thought of myself as a descendant of any of them but simply as an American from the state of Vermont. This idea of leaving the past behind and becoming part of a new place seems to have shaped this country and its inhabitants into the place it is today.