The name of my first child is going to be Pizza. No, that's ridiculous. I just made that up. Obviously "Pizza" is much more appropriate for a middle name, first name Pepperoni, nickname Pepper. I've put a lot of thought into this, mostly because I take parenthood very seriously, but also because everybody can agree that pizza is one of mankind's best innovations to date. Not only is pizza delicious and nonjudgmental of your life choices, but it is incredibly versatile: it can be made into a pizza cake, it can inspire Katy Perry fan fiction, and it can even save your life. Obviously we all form very emotional attachments to pizza from birth, which is why you go through so many very intense emotions while waiting for your pizza delivery to arrive.
Now, I'm aware that when I order delivery pizza, the odds are very slim that I am the only person ordering pizza from that particular pizza place. But somehow the common sense that was once instilled in me by parents and teachers and mentors over the years is all but shot to hell the moment I click "Complete Order" on a pizza delivery website. I'm pretty sure if I ever do get arrested, it will be for the neighbors' noise complaints from my stomach growling waiting for a pizza to arrive, or some other consequence from any of these other emotional stages I endure:
Total and Unabashed Smugness
Look at me, being an adult. I ordered that pizza all by myself. On the phone. And I had to communicate with another live human being to do it. I'm feeling invincible. Maybe I'll join a roller derby league.
Uncontainable Excitement
It's finally hitting you: there's a pizza coming. It's going to be warm and cheesy and have all of your favorite toppings, and all you have to do is sit here and watch sitcom reruns on Netflix while you wait.
More Anticipation Than You've Felt For Any Date You've Ever Gone On In Your Life
If you close your eyes and hold your hands out you can almost feel the warmth of that pizza box under your palms. If you run your tongue along the roof of your mouth you can almost taste it. You are maybe considering a film career in fetishizing pizza pornography.
Mounting Impatience
The honeymoon period of waiting for this pizza is over and the first stages of hangry-ness are starting to settle in. You have refreshed the page with the delivery time window approximately 413 times, and it still says "about a half an hour." Still? What do these people think they're doing, abiding by traffic laws and being responsible citizens? You're hungry, dammit. THERE IS NO TIME FOR THE LAW RIGHT NOW.
Spiraling Paranoia
Wait – What if you didn't order that pizza at all? It's been a long week. Maybe you just hallucinated it. Or maybe they accidentally delivered it to your neighbor across the hall, the one you don't know very well, the one that looks like just the kind of woman who would take a free delivery pizza without questioning it.
Apocalyptic Panic Unlike Any You've Ever Known
No, you ordered that pizza, you're sure of it. And if the pizza delivery person is here, something must be terribly, terribly wrong. Zombies. Flash floods. Twi-hards. What the hell is going on out there? You would check outside the window but suddenly you are afraid to see anything that you can't un-see.
Resentment
YOU PUT ON PANTS FOR THIS. WHERE THE F#(& IS YOUR PIZZA?!
Hatred That You Reserve Only For Mortal Enemies And The Script Writers Of How I Met Your Mother
This delivery pizza may never come, and you will be avenged. Your children's children's children will know of what happened to you on this night. The story will be carved into your headstone, tattooed on your descendants, branded into your brain until your last breath on this earth. There is no forgiveness left in you. No mercy. There is nothing but the empty space where a pizza should have been.
Dead Inside
You were a person once. There were people who loved you, people you were capable of loving in return. But all of that seems so distant now. Just a lonely whisper in the wind. Is this what it feels like to accept your own mortality?
A Last Lingering Hope
It is fragile, but it is there. And's the only thing keeping you tethered to this earth.
Unprecented Shock
Was that...no, it couldn't possibly – did you just hear...did someone just ring the doorbell?
Sudden, Heart-Stopping Fear
As you stumble disbelievingly to the door, your eyes start to shine with inexplicable tears. You are suddenly filled with a fear unlike any you've ever felt. What if – god, you can't believe you're even thinking this – what if this pizza isn't everything you hoped it would be? What if, after spending all this time building it up in your mind, this pizza turns out to be only slightly delicious instead of otherworldly?
Pure Bliss
Heaven is a place on earth, and that place is nestled between pockets of grease and cheese. Thank goodness you were so strong, that your faith never wavered in the face of all your doubt. There is no trauma done by waiting for food delivery that the first bite of pizza can't fix.
