"I shouldn't throw this away. I can wash it out and use it again. It's one of the good slide-close bags. I only used it for, like, an hour. It's a waste of money to throw this away. Oh, sweet Jesus, I am thinking about WASHING OUT A ZIPLOC BAG AND USING IT AGAIN. I AM TURNING INTO MY MOTHER. This is terrible. I have to start a blog about myself now. [pause] I can't make myself throw this away. This is what Phyllis feels like all the time. I have an emotional connection to this bag now. I'm going to save it and make my family bury my ashes in it. I have to throw this away. I can't do it. It's a SLIDER BAG."
Finally I realized that I had been hovering over the trash can clutching a dirty Ziploc in a death grip, and I dropped the bag in and broke out in a cold sweat. This must be how Mom feels when I clean out her Tupperware cabinets. Mom loves Tupperware. She has Tupperware that is older than I am. She has giant Tupperware that she puts little Tupperware inside. If the house needs a new roof, she can build one out of mismatched Tupperware lids. When KFC started putting side dishes in these things:
Mom thought she had died and gone to container heaven. She lovingly placed her tiny KFC Tupperware with her Cool Whip and Country Crock containers, taking care not to start an avalanche of Gladware lest she be buried alive in reusable plastic. "My God!" the paramedics would have said. "Get one of the rectangular lids to dig her out! No, not that one, that's square. No, the good sturdy rectangle. Not the flimsy one. That one doesn't fit anything, but don't throw it out because she might have lent it to someone and it could turn up and then it would be lidless. I know, spaghetti sauce stains are impossible to get out of clear plastic, but it IS clean. It just LOOKS dirty."
But I'm no better. I can't stop thinking about my poor discarded Ziploc. I guess I know how I'm spending my evening:
Next on my list will be ironing aluminum foil so it looks like new, and then I plan to kill myself.
