We don’t often have bananas in our house these days. They’re just too fickle a proposition: either too yellow and too firm, or too black and too soft. Obviously somewhere inbetween was the perfect moment, but it must have been when we were out. So there they’d lie (which might, I suppose, be the problem – I see sensible people hang them up these days) in our fruit bowl, until they become an insult – and, more importantly, a danger – to the fruit around them. Then they’d be discreetly transferred across to the tub of perishables destined for the compost. And then a few days later out they’d go, to continue their miserable life-cycle out of doors and out of sight and mind.
I struggle with other food, too, but nothing’s quite as tricky as a banana. And, in fact, nothing on the domestic front is quite as tricky as the kitchen. Washing seems to come naturally enough, and tidying and cleaning are just about doable – and can always wait – but the constant demands of the stomach on the one hand and food on the other still catch me out.
It’s been, I imagine, half a lifetime or so of grappling with the problem. But there are other things which have preoccupied me just as much and which, happily, have now been mastered. In the very best cases, it’s been but a slight adjustment: the toaster shifting sideways and suddenly finding its rightful resting place, the new kitchen roll holder performing its function admirably… Even after many years of life, then, I still have within my grasp the pleasure of bettering what’s gone before.
And thank god life contains enough complexity that there’ll always be room for such improvement, and unpredictable enough that our own expiry dates don’t announce themselves ahead of time. It all gives me hope that there’s still a good chance of a breakthrough in those other kitchen issues of mine.
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