25 May 2026, Freewriters Community Daily Writing Prompt Day 3114: designed to overeat
“See, the thing about Rob: he is designed to overeat, because in his mind while his body runs around and his mouth runs even faster for like 14 hours a day, he needs all the food – but when he gets old, that is going to be a problem for him – but we can't put him on a diet at five, can we?”
“No, Glendella, we can't, but notice: his plate is sized for him, and he just doesn't know it.”
Mrs. Thalia Ludlow was moved by the tenderness of the love between ten-year-old Glendella and five-year-old Lil' Robert Ludlow … the ten-year-old looked out for the five-year-old in a special way, but sometimes needed more understanding.
“Robert is always going to be asking for more and better and again, and if you give him two choices of good things he is always going to say 'yes' because he definitely wants both – that's Rob's personality, Glendella, and around food he does burn off a tremendous amount of energy running around and up into this house, the Lee house, and the Trent house and talking to everybody. And that's where Papa and I come in.”
“Right – it's a good thing you are Good Grandma and Upgrade Papa, because I hate to think of what would happen to Rob if he would have had to live through what I had to live through.”
“But that's why all eight of you are here, Glendella: God equipped Papa and I to give all y'all room to be exactlywho you are supposed to be … and the sense to buy small replica plates so Rob can think he is getting as much as his namesake.”
Glendella started laughing.
“Robert Edward Ludlow III thinks he eats as much as Robert Edward Ludlow Sr., aka Upgrade Papa? That's wild, Good Grandma!”
“Isn't it?” Mrs. Ludlow said with a laugh. “But if you watch at breakfast, lunch, and dinner, Rob is always checking to make sure he gets the some things on his plate that Papa does.”
“See, now I gotta really watch!” Glendella said.
“We just make sure he gets an appropriate amount of the same food,” Mrs. Ludlow said. “He does actually need a lot of calories – if you want to watch something, watch me forget to give that boy his snacks and watch that boy guzzle milk straight from the carton and pass it around.”
“How does he even do that as his size?” Glendella said.
“Where there's a Robert Edward Ludlow with a will, there's a way,” Mrs. Ludlow said. “Just ask the Trents about the milk sessions – we put an extra inch on Milton and Gracie this summer, too, while Papa was trying to figure out how he kept buying a gallon of milk and needing to do so twice a week!”