While I was in elementary school way back in the dark ages, a teacher posed the question “Do you eat to live or live to eat?”

Wanting to sound scholarly, my answer was you eat to live. After studying the tried and true science book, one could not give any other answer. After all, the four primary food groups had been drummed into your head by early elementary school and you would even remind your Mom that she may have not covered all the groups with a meal that she had cooked.

But moving forward a few decades that question may now have a slightly different response. In fact if you polled several of the restaurants in Hartselle, you might find that I place a lot of emphasis on food. I really like to eat and unfortunately many of the things I like to consume might not always be considered healthy.

I am not sure why a bag of tortilla chips is so tempting. Also if you have not tried the new peanut butter M&Ms, you may want to stay away from them. I am not sure what the Hershey Company includes in the ingredients, but I have found them to be highly addictive.

In fact if we open a bag here at the office they do not even last half a day, and by bag, a large one. I even have to hurry by the candy aisle to make sure I am not tempted by them.

Food is defined as substance consumed to provide nutritional support for the body. If that is the only definition we used, deciding what food to eat would be a simple task. With any activity planned, however, we place food very close to the top of the list.

We use food to celebrate births, marriages, birthdays, anniversaries, marriages, graduations and job promotions. We even use food to comfort those in mourning over the passing of a loved one. This use of food is not just a southern tradition, even in Old Testament times the fatted calf was prepared for guests, even those not expected.

If you spend time going through old photo albums you will see that food was always involved in any type of gathering of friends and family. How many of us can still remember a favorite dish that you looked forward to at each special occasion?

In years past, the food was prepared at home. Now, it prepared outside of the home or the gathering takes place at a culinary establishment.

Regardless of where the food it is served, we will be there with fork in hand.

Randy Garrison is the president and publisher of the Hartselle Enquirer.