I practice the art of noticing by writing about small moments in everyday life. I explore the thoughts, feelings, and memories they awaken, and the words that give me the courage to write them. The Ordinary is rooted in a simple belief: even the most mundane moments can inspire a story.
“(On the other hand, it’s nearly certain that the person being written about will not accept that they are anything like the description, so it’s best not to obsess about it.)”1
My hot cocoa mix expired eight years ago. Mom bought me several canisters around the time I started living in my second apartment. Southern grocery stores carry Tim Hortons coffee, but not their cocoa. It was the mix I grew up with, and she wanted me to have a decent stash of something to remind me of home.
Mom’s pantry has been an impressive stash of unused goods for as long as I can remember. Soup mixes that sounded too good to pass up, but then were pushed back behind bottles of salad dressing she couldn’t always find when she wanted it. Chocolate dessert cups to fill with one of the magazine recipes she saved but never got around to trying out. Bottles and packages she accidentally collected because she forgot she already had them. The horde of cinnamon chips she cleared off the store shelves one year, thinking she’d never see them for sale again. They’re an infamous inside family joke since she kept finding more bags long after she was sure she finally used them all up.
Every few years, she mustered the strength to purge her pantry. Why did she find things that expired a decade ago? Had they slipped through the last purge? Or had it been longer than she thought since the last one?
The purge always brought out strong emotions in her. She repeatedly muttered, “What was I thinking when I bought this?” There were frequent shouts of “awwww!” when she discovered a long-forgotten, long-past-its-best-used-by-date ingredient for a recipe she never forgot wanting to try. When she took a break from it all, she’d shake her head and confess the whole thing made her feel bad. Like she was silly for forgetting what she already had and falling behind on the ideas for things she never got to make. Burdened by the excess.
I wondered why the cocoa didn’t taste as chocolatey as I remembered. This was the last can in my stash. Maybe it was time to set Tim Hortons aside and find a new mix. Or maybe I just needed a fresh can. I wasn’t sure which of my old addresses I was living at the last time Mom stocked me up with cocoa, only that she gave me enough so I wouldn’t run out any time soon.
Two cans made it with me to my current address. During the last move, I had to throw out the half-full can I’d been working my way through for who knows how long. It was a shame to waste what I couldn’t use. I didn’t think to check the expiration date then. Besides, Mom would send more if I told her we were out. Just like she had with the now-discontinued mustard from one of our favorite breweries in her area.
Two cans were enough to last a long while. Plenty to offer our friends and guests who couldn’t pass up a cozy cup of hot cocoa in the evening. Plenty for our first winter huddled inside with a newborn. It was something we never had to question: whether we had enough.
Attributions
- Becky Broadyway and Doug Hesse, Creating Nonfiction: A Guide and Anthology (2009).
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