Cob: (n) the center of the ear of corn

What do you do when the job you were given, which grants you purpose and function, is no longer needed?

It is a sobering thought.

But that is the yearly reality of the cob.

Once the corn is removed, the cob remaining seems to have no purpose. Yet without the corncob, how would we ever have figured out corn?

Was corn supposed to grow, kernel by kernel, on plants?

No, you can store a hundred or more kernels of corn on a single cob and carry it right out the door. But once you dislodge the corn from the cob, the holder no longer has value.

People used to use cobs for biofuel, to heat homes and such, but they burned so quickly that it was fairly impractical. In other words, nobody could eat enough corn to stay warm.

Every once in a while, it’s ground up, placed inside mattresses, or added to furniture polish to give some roughness to the mixture.

But basically, if you’re a cob, your job is done when the corn is eaten.

How would that feel? (Of course, the point could be made that corn cobs don’t actually have sensation.)

The design is so perfect–two little points at each end, where you place your fingers so you don’t burn them on the hot kernels as you chomp away.

I don’t know. Maybe we’re all corn cobs. Just skeletons, holding our parts together for a season, until our corny lives are done. And then we’re looking for some place to discard the cob.

God. This is dismal.

I think I shall stop writing now.

But it did make me hungry for corn…