Some days are just hard. This morning I encountered someone who I had not seen for several years. Now sometimes this sort of thing is all hugs and tears and recounting of stories involving Galliano and a bath towel. But this was not one of those times. The last time I encountered this person they were speaking to me, in a somewhat raised tone, telling me all the things that I should be doing, in a place where there were many other people. It was shaming. What made it worse was that they were utterly in the wrong, on almost every level, but I did not have power to engage in confrontation, even to prove myself right. There is a strong possibility that I would still back down if the situation reoccurred. It was a memory that instantly took me back to feeling hurt and many other things. The day slipped into a downhill mode until I saw a friend at lunchtime, and then things became much sunnier. But I am left with a most oppressive feeling. It is now almost 1am, and there isn’t any ice cream in the freezer for me to inhale.
I use the word ‘inhale’ quite loosely, I can make a tub of Ben and Jerry most glorious vegan ice cream (cookies and peanut butter… oh yes..) last two sittings. And yes, I do likely regard this legendary feat of Atlas like strength as something of an achievement. ‘You didn’t eat the whole tub in a single sitting, in under an hour?’ Sweet and hairy Moses woman, you are restraint incarnate!’. It occurs to me, that for me to guarantee having ice cream in the house, when I am feeling somewhat below par, I would need to have around five tubs in the house at any one given time. And I only have a three drawer freezer.
At this point, I started to ponder if I could make room for said imaginary five tubs of B&J’s most delectably delectable cream of froziness (like ‘cosiness’ in a chilly variant) in my freezer. Short answer, if I set my mind to a task I can achieve anything! Long answer, this would involve throwing out, or at least removing the following:
- The plethora of frozen bananas that I am never going to turn into banana cake.
- The ice pops from last summer that are all the colours that are not blue or red (thus will only provide ‘decorative’ pazazz to a somewhat blandly coloured bottom drawer.
- The eight ‘cold packs’ that I have in my freezer, despite almost never using them for their intended purpose. If ever injury necessitates the use of one, then it is maybe it is acceptable to have a couple on standby, but if ever it gets up to needing all eight, there is a fair chance that I should be phoning for an ambulance. And not rummaging about in my freezer.
- Various things in bags. No one knows what they are. No one ever should.
- Fruit that was lovingly prepared, individually frozen, then transferred into bags, possibly around three years ago (The freezer itself is coming up to five, so there is a couple of years leeway on this), with the intention of healthy fresh smoothies, sumptuous pies and most amazingly crumbly crumbles. It is now all so badly freezer burned that the imagined acidity could likely prove medicinal. In waking the dead.
In short, my freezer needs a clearout.
I love how in one moment, I am fixating on an event long past that is making me feel sad and then, when I challenge it with a little narrative, I feel pleased that I have identified, a quite clearly, long overdue job. Which makes me smile.
What would, of course, have made me smile sooner, was B&J’s vegan ice cream.
Map Point. Why am I fixating on things that remind me of pain?
Shiny journey 