Now opening — or not — near you
By Joyce Reehling
Eyes open and all the thoughts that start the day begin a race in her brain to see which will get there first. She will stumble in a fog of sleep with a hint of a dream. And thus it begins, a series of questions and answers and challenges.
Up she gets to wash hands and face and brush her teeth. An almost ridiculous task as she will have tea and toast or cereal and have to brush all over again. It’s a ritual — to be followed by the ceremony of opening things.
At the intersection of age and the half-life of jars, boxes of tea, bandages and condiments, there have been developments — no, conspiracies — to demonstrate that youth has taken a bus out of town.
Twice a week the day begins with replacing her hormone replacement patch. The “glue” that will attach to her skin has a cover on it which must be removed. A glue that will, before the next time it is to be replaced, not fully adhere to her body like it stubbornly adheres to that cover now. She takes a deep breath and tries not to scream.
Padding down the hall and into the kitchen, there is a new box of tea to open. Such boxes have a “Tear Here” tab with the vague promise that it will actually tear here or somewhere near the line of the cutout guides. It almost never happens that way. No, she must first put her finger on either side of the “guides” in the hope that the tab will begin to tear at least a little, then reroute her efforts down that line. This never works. And it is now that her first thoughts of murder, or at least a tribunal to try, convict and sentence the designers of these tortuous schemes, takes hold.
Perhaps death by perforation.
Somewhere, leading otherwise innocent lives, are the people who devised the “Push Down and Turn” tops of this world, the ones that never quite catch correctly. Or the bandage string that she is convinced was never intended to really work. Or the tiny tops of small objects that are screwed on so tight that she dreams of having a tiny vice for them in the garage.
Perhaps death by vice.
Tea brewed, she must now confront the milk carton plug with a circle on top that would cut the finger off a Navy SEAL. She reaches for the chopstick that has become her way of wrenching this diabolical thing off. And she hasn’t even had her first sip of tea.
FedEx has left a small box, probably sometime yesterday, but they never seem to ring the bell anymore, so she discovers it through the kitchen window. Again the dreaded “Tear Here.”
This tab, obviously designed by a particularly malevolent person, always breaks off and never goes beyond the first 1/8 of an inch. Screwdrivers or a box cutter must be carefully employed. With the box finally open, there is a plastic bag with no visible way to open save cutting it. Should she need to return the object they will tell her that it must be returned as shipped. They never say how, since it will never fit back into the bag or into the box. They have, it would seem, developed packing methods similar to sea monkeys, starting tiny and then exploding.
Perhaps death by shrinking.
No sip of tea has been had, nor toast, but by now she is boggled in the brain and her blood is running hot. Others must surely feel these frustrations but the fact that she is not alone is, oddly, no comfort.
She looks out the window for her reset button or a “Push Down and Turn” to begin this day all over again. And then she sips her tea. And sighs with dreams of a courtroom with these designers at the defense table and a jury of women over 50.
Finally, a smile. PS
Joyce Reehling is a frequent contributor and good friend of PineStraw.
