Potatoes and mayo make Wang

“I am a potato salad,” I said to one person. “I beg your pardon?” came the reply.”I am a potato salad,” I tried again.”Really? Can I bite you?””I am a potato salad.””Which online quiz are you getting that from?” “I am a potato salad.” “Well, then I am Bill Gates.”I felt the urge to confess my true identity one night, and the above were the answers I got. Why can’t people just deal with the fact that their roommate, classmate or acquaintance is a potato salad? I mean, they dealt with the potato salad at Danforth just fine – although I wouldn’t want myself dealt with in the same way that Danforth potato salads are. There are many benefits to being a potato salad. For one, you have the perfect excuse to be high-fat – you’re made with real mayo. You are excused from showering, because the water will wash away your flavors, and come on, who wants to be a potato salad without taste? If the weather got any warmer around here, you’d be excused from class because staying in the heat for too long, you’d go sour. Another really good thing about being a potato salad is that french fries are like your cousins, and you’re not only welcomed but also almost obligated to befriend them. Mashed potatoes are your sisters. Being a potato salad means that you have family all over the world.Being an “X-Files” fan, I am always deeply moved when I see Agent Mulder take out his badge, flash it to the camera and yell to the mutant or extraterrestrial lime Jell-O, “FBI! You’re under arrest!” Or when Scully introduces the two of them to local police forces, “I’m special agent Dana Scully and we are with the FBI.” When I was a child I always fantasized myself taking out a perfectly fresh glob of mayo and screaming “Emily Wang! Potato Salad!” And even though I am just a freshman right now, I can’t wait until my first job interview when I can properly introduce myself. “Hello, my name is Emily Wang and I am a potato salad, specializing in mayonnaise.” One of my friends is a tuna salad. She said that being a tuna salad is an evolutionarily beneficial thing, because vegetarians don’t eat tuna salad, and therefore she has a much better chance of surviving than I do. I think she’d have been right 200 years ago. With all the rush for Atkins nowadays, people would choose her over the packed-with-carbs potato salad. They say that a good laugh is worth a billion dollars, and by that logic I am the richest salad in this universe. I get my daily – or hourly – dose of good laughing when I look at myself in the mirror every morning. Ha! Ha! I see a potato salad! What’s there to laugh about if you just see a college student in the mirror? There’s nothing funny or unique about that. Everyone looks into the mirror and sees a woman or a man. But a potato salad looks into the mirror and sees potato covered in mayonnaise, spotted with parsley. That’s got to be funny.Wang can be reached at ewang@campustimes.org.