In Which I’m Dreaming©

It was New Year’s Eve and my husband turned off the ten o’clock news before it finished.  We are fuddy-duddy’s and never stay up until midnight.

“What are your New Year’s resolutions?” he asked.  Like an old married couple, we were stumbling down the hall towards bed.

“Well, this year I actually came up with some,” I said.  I unfolded a lined piece of paper.  “I only have a few, and they are:  no chocolate, no cookies, no cake or pie, no soda, chips, or fries.”

My husband had a pained look on his face.

“What’s wrong with the list?” I asked, sitting on the bed.

“Don’t you think it’s sort of…ambitious?” he asked.

“You don’t think I can do it?” I asked.

“I don’t think anyone could do it!” he chuckled.

“Well, we’ll see.  I don’t think we have any of those foods in the house right now.  I’m off to a good start.”  And with that, we turned off the light and fell asleep.

On the Christmas tree, one candy cane sprang to life.

“Men!” it shouted, jumping to the end of the branch.  “We’ve got work to do!”

Two more candy canes followed his lead.  All three jumped to the floor and got to the kitchen quickly.

“Men, I hope you’re aware of the dire situation facing us this evening.”  All three candy canes wrangled themselves to the counter tops.  

“Did you hear the list of New Year’s resolutions?  Why, if she has her way, no sugar at all will be consumed in this house!  I don’t know about you, but I will not be window dressing for a dying tree!  Candy canes were meant to be eaten!”

“Here, here!” the other candy canes cheered.

“Stripes, rifle through the pantry!  Crookneck, get that refrigerator door open!  I’ll look through the cabinets for hiding spots.  She’s got to have sugar in the house somewhere!” he yelled.

For several minutes the animated sugar sticks went about their business, upending soup cans, knocking over condiment bottles, and spilling containers of children’s pain reliever.  When they were finished, they had assembled a motley assortment of food items.  The lead candy cane reviewed each product.

“Stripes, what did you find in the pantry?”

“Well, it was bare bones, sir, but I got creative.  As you can see, I found old confectioner’s sugar, unsweetened cocoa (easily fixed), a stray granola bar (chocolate-score!) and an almost-gone bag of Ruffles.”

“Good job!  Crookneck, what do you have there?”

“Well, sir, she did a pretty good job of gutting the refrigerator of sugar.  All I could find was whipped topping in a can and a half-empty bottle of cola.”

“Well, we’ll have to go with what we have.  All I turned up was stale Halloween candy and some scraps of paper.  Alright, let’s finish this job!”

The house was cold when I got up with the kids the next morning.  Our toddler greeted me with, “Mommy, I’m hungry!” which was her usual dialogue.

“Let’s see what we have to eat,” I said, opening the refrigerator.  “Hmm, that’s strange,” I said to nobody in particular.  “I didn’t know we still had cola in here.”

Our Kindergarten son pushed past me and swung open the fridge door.

“Mom, look!  It’s chocolate and whipped cream!  Let’s make hot cocoa, it’s New Year’s Day after all!”

That night I dropped several grocery bags in the kitchen.

“Let’s watch a movie,” my husband suggested.

“Great.  I’ll get some snacks,” I said.

A few minutes later, my husband said, “What’s all this?”

“Well, you have a selection to choose from.  After the hot cocoa this morning, I found the chips just sitting there for lunch, and left you some; then I baked cookies with some ingredients I found sitting on the shelf.  On the way to the grocery store, I discovered a ratty piece of candy in my purse next to a coupon for a chocolate bar.”

“But what about your resolutions?”

“I tried soo hard to follow those!  And the funny thing is, last night I seem to remember dreaming about the food coming to life and wanting me to eat it!”

My husband pursed his lips.

“I know, I know,” I said. 

 Some days, that’s just how it feels.

©2010, Kim Knuth.  All rights reserved.