Why has pizza been called the world’s most perfect food? Because it includes every taste and texture we crave, all in one dish: sweet, savory, chewy, crunchy. Oh yeah, and cheese, tons of cheese. What’s not to love? And yet, when I first tried pizza I didn’t like it. My primitive kid-buds preferred squishy-sweet canned spaghetti.

But I rediscovered the world’s most perfect food a million new taste receptors later. By the time I was a teenager, 19^th century beer-hall-themed “pizza parlors” had become a thing (go figure). People sang along to tack-pianos, while crunching their way through big, crispy communal pizzas. Pizza parlors were tailor-made for groups. And in my case, that meant high school drama geeks.

We’d just finished opening night of the anti-racist musical Finian’s Rainbow. In it, I played Og the leprechaun, and my buddy Mike played the leader of a black gospel group. Just for fun, we decided to go to the cast party at our local Shakey’s Pizza Parlor–in full costume and make-up.

Our little suburb had no Black people. But Mike’s Greek complexion and nearly-African-American hair-itage (along with some subtle make-up) made him a believable and rather dapper black man.

There were no openly gay people where we lived either. So, when a black dude and his white, cross-dressing “boyfriend”—decked out in green eye-shadow and cute, pointy little shoes—walked in arm-in-arm, well…let’s just say the music stopped.

We sat down amid the after-football crowd, who began to rumble. Loudly. But then we got up and moved to the theatre crowd table. Our fellow actors roared with delight. Our drama teacher Mr. Baker, whispered, “Gutsy, boys, very gutsy.” And then he grinned. Loudly.

As a young adult, I discovered a wide world full of chewy-thick, crunchy-thin, chunky tomato-y, smooth Alfredo-y, garlicy pesto-y, profoundly cheesified pizzas to love, and began eating it every Friday night.

I eventually found a woman who was equally passionate about pizza, and took it as a sign from heaven (or maybe Italy). So I married her. A few years further on, each of our toddler daughters tried their first solid food–pizza–on a Friday night. And each, having inherited their mother’s superior taste-buds, fell instantly in love with it. And why shouldn’t they? After all…

It’s the world’s most perfect food.

P.S. I’m on a brief hiatus from the My Real Memoir series normally posted on Tuesdays. It will return soon.