Back when my son was younger he had a game he’d like to play with me: “What’s your favorite _______?”
I sucked at that game because I could hardly ever come up with an answer.
Either I have lots of a favorites or none. It’s a family thing; My father has a favorite son, a favorite daughter, I have a favorite wife, a favorite fluffy cat, a favorite shy cat; of course my father has one son and one daughter, as I have one wife, a fluffy cat and shy cat. Favorite = anything I like that I can create a catagorey for, except when used sarcasiticly, which is often.
I have favorites! List available upon request…some things just seem to be hard-wired into me from an early age. Blond men, white roses, long hair, sky blue, vacation at the beach, pizza and Chinese food, cats and fresh water tropical fish…always revert back to my old favorites.
Instead of favorites, I have ruts. I’ll eat the same food, wear the same color, pursue the same hobby for weeks or months or even years. Then finally something else will spark the imagination and I’ll go with that for awhile.
I have a difficult time with favorites. There are many things I like, and some that I like more than others. But to pick just one thing that I like more than anything else in that category is something I can’t generally do. I like balance, so, for example, when we buy Coke at the grocery store, I might go out of my way to have a Pepsi some time that week.
My father-in-law, on the other hand, is a favoritist to the point of sometimes not even trying anything else. When he comes to visit he has his favorite restaurant and that’s where we eat. He won’t even hear about trying someplace new. He has his favorite brand of gasoline and he has traveled miles out of the way (and run out of gas a few times) searching for a station. He gave up hunting for awhile when he could not find his favorite ammunition.
I think the only favorite that I definitely have is candy bar. If I could eat no other candy bar but one for the rest of my life, that one would be PayDay. I absolutely LOVE that candybar.
I have a favourite just-about-anything. And often a least favourite. I hesitate to psychologise about it though.
I’ve lived here for over five years now, and been to just about all the restaurants a number of times. Name a restaurant, and I’ll be able to tell you what I order there. Sigh.
I’m definitely not. In my opinion, the fact that anything approachs the level of favorite lifts it beyond ranking. All great works are sui generis.