Forced into compromise
I’ve lost the touch. Whereas the Easter bunny role suited me well (not the suit, the role) two decades ago, I fell out of training. Today, I was forced into compromise.
You see, waiting until an hour before closing time, in a small market area, is pretty much a guarantee that all the good stuff will be gone. To good home, etc.; it’s just that tomorrow, when the others awake with a need for chocolate, they’re going to have to settle for the expensive kind. No fake hollow hens, or pandas. None of the usual “milk chocolatey” product in oversize packaging. It’s sad when 100g of anything requires 200g of formed plastic and paper to get the product to market.
And the “eggs” made from cheap jelly beans and mallow? None. All off to greener pastures. Not enough left in the store for a Monday sale, either. Maybe we’ll have to go to Walmart…
Another problem with this holiday is that our numbers are down. I don’t know what to do with a ham larger than a basketball. Overdose? I brought home something smaller, and filled out my need to buy with a plastic wrapped corned beef (not for tomorrow; it was the first time I’d ever seen such a thing on sale, and my freezer will allow me to hold until cabbage season).
There, ready for the holiday in spite of everything.
On the front lawn today, the squirrel count rose to five. I refuse to chart the increase on a graph, for fear of panic. My life is turning into a cartoon deli routine.
