We all know that there are two types of people: those who eat to live and those who live to eat. Taken literally, neither one is a very good way to live life. Having said that, I will admit — to no one’s surprise — that I am the latter. I would, however, change the “i” in live to an “o”, making it love to eat.

It doesn’t take long to determine if a person enjoys food. It has nothing to do with their weight or size. You can tell because they start talking about food almost immediately when you meet them.

Bill had the surgery on his face yesterday. It went very well, by the way. They got all of the cancer cells with the first cut, which was a lucky break, at least according to the surgeon. He would know. I could tell him whether to use there, their, or they’re but he can tell me when a surgery has gone very well.

As he was stitching up Bill’s wound, and as I was visibly trying not to watch because YUCK, the doctor asked, “So, where are you guys going to go to lunch?” That, my friends, told me immediately that this was a man who lived to eat.

I told him we were going to go to Oregano’s to celebrate the fact that the doctor didn’t have to whack on Bill’s face all day long.

“Ah, that’s a good choice,” he said. He then proceeded to tell me where he had eaten lunch that day (which explained why it took two-and-a-half hours to learn that there had been no cancer cells instead of the two hours they had promised). He not only told me where he ate, he told me WHAT he ate.

“I love to talk about food,” he told me, unnecessarily. As he stitched and stitched on Bill’s cheek, he asked me questions about where we like to eat and what we like to order. He approved of Red, White, and Brew — one of our favorite Mesa restaurants — and became very excited when he learned we had recently eaten at North Italia Restaurant.

“That’s one of my wife’s favorite restaurants,” he said. “She always gets the seafood pasta.”

Having said that, he was nevertheless very excited when he learned that I had ordered the short rib pasta dish.

“That’s a great choice,” he said, stitching, stitching, stitching.

If I had more time to talk to him, I would love to know if he liked to cook as much as he liked to eat. Though he wore a mask the entire time we visited and he stitched, I think he was of middle eastern descent, and I’m basing that on the fact that his first name was Ali and he had black hair. Oh, and I study ethnonationalism in my spare time. But that got me wondering if he prepared middle eastern food at home, and made me hungry for hummus.

At any rate, our talk about food kept me from passing out as he stitched Bill’s face. Perhaps that was his plan all along.