Leave My Allegory Out of This

My text message alert (the upward sliding whistle) sounded as I reached for a second glass of water. I left the cell phone on the counter as I drank down the tumbler of coldness and told myself that all I needed to complete my task was water, that I certainly had the energy cells but without H20, I couldn't make it. About an hour earlier I’d packed an old Anatomy and Physiology book into a box and the formula for Aerobic Respiration threatened to make an appearance in my brain after all these years.

“Krebs Cycle? What the hell?” I’d long forgotten many of the things I used to think were important. I set the glass on the counter and picked up my phone. Reading the cheerful greeting, I decided it could wait.

I spent an hour moving boxes and bins from my storage closet to the spare bedroom in my apartment. Fortunately said storage closet was only about 300 yards away. I carried tennis rackets and golf clubs the length of a football field. I moved my grandmother’s china and my mother’s Avon treasures.

Most of those boxes hadn’t been opened in over a year.




Each time I opened my apartment door to drop off a load my phone alerted me to another message. Did I want to listen to some music? Was I hungry? Of course I did and of course I was. Unfortunately, I was busy.

I used the metal luggage cart my daughter used in her band camp days to carry boxes of photographs and boxes of toys. My mother’s heart wants to believe that her high school language wasn’t as colorful as mine as she loaded her French horn and suitcase on those little rollers. My soon to be ex-neighbors got an earful of cursing as heavy boxes challenged the tiny dolly and I maneuvered through the hallways of the complex, sweating and mumbling about my remaining adenosine triphosphates.

My final trip yielded a card table and my Hurricane Preparedness kit (toilet paper, flashlight, batteries, canned food, battery operated fan, can opener, bleach). Two more things I didn’t use since moving into this place in December of 2009. I’m happy that we weren’t hit by a natural disaster. I’ll leave the emergency supplies intact and hope that they remain untouched for another five years.

My phone was blinking after I’d finished a bath in a tub full of cool water. It felt wonderful to soak away the heat and dust of generations of saving pretty things from the past. I settled into my big, ugly, old, doesn’t-go-with-anything chair that I use every day.

I haven’t had a meaningful, romantic, physical relationship with a man in two years.

My working title to this essay was, “Leave my allegory out of this.” It’s too easy. All these boxes, the dust. Right. Laugh about it. I have. I do.

As I think about it, I like the title. I also like the thought of unpacking a few boxes before I move. I have a month. I’ll condense and take fewer things with me. There’s no way I need some of those things. (I think tax records from ten years ago can be shredded.)

But before I go, I’ll be having dinner and listening to some music with that man. We have a date. I’m no dummy.



©Michelle Scofield, May 21, 2011 All Rights Reserved