It’s a new year. A new month. A new day in the Kirschner household. Except I never got around to changing the calendar, so maybe it’s still December? Or maybe I’m still in my pajamas and in this latest edition of my life unedited, I’m trying to figure out why my Nespresso machine keeps rejecting the pod only to discover to the tune of much early morning muttering and cacophony of caffeine deprivation I’ve effectively inserted a K-cup into the Nespresso pod receptacle after trying to defrost spray cleaner I thought was orange juice.
Not much has changed, I’ve kept exactly none of my New Year’s resolutions and am still coming to terms with the whole lotta lattes I mobile ordered after realizing (way too late in the game) I was never gonna be the lucky “Starbucks for a Month, a Year, a Lifetime” winner and so will likely be doing a lot of at-home brewing from now until the foreseeable future. Humbling. Truly.
I’m not sure how people survive without coffee. I know they exist, these decaffeinated do-gooders, walking around with their herbal teas and gallons of ‘you’re almost there … just 128 fluid ounces to go’ water bottles. I’m just not sure how they actually, you know, stay vertical or string multiple sentences together or manage to keep their two year old from using the entire surface of his body as a canvas for (really thought they were washable) neon markers Santa made the mistake of gifting him.
The good news is that blue really is his color. The bad news is that green really isn’t the cat’s, and all those big ideas I had before winter break about pulling a Marie Kondo and putting contraband Crayola out of reach literally began and ended with me opening exactly one cabinet, having some sort of episode at the sight of spilled Epsom salts, and spending the remainder of December fantasy hunting houses I will never, ever afford to purchase while polishing off the remnants of our liquor cabinet. (I’m really partial to this one shoreline condo off the coast of somewhere I have about as much chance of pronouncing as I do of affording with an open concept and ridiculously amazing views, if anyone’s feeling particularly philanthropic and might like to throw in a couple of nice leather couches?)
Anyway, I’ve come to this riveting realization, life altering really, and no, it’s not that K-cups do not belong in the Nespresso machine, like cleaning spray doesn’t belong in the freezer but that … true confession direct from Hurlbutt St.: I don’t want to change. I don’t want to drink 128 fluid ounces of water or give up my lattes or that drawer in the kitchen that I tell the kids is full of cleaning supplies but actually contains the majority of their leftover Halloween candy that I continue to consume at odd intervals when my life feels like it’s quietly unraveling around me and there’s nothing I can do to stop it.
Sorry. That took a dark turn.
My point is that, while I like the whole concept of resolution making and fresh starts and not feeling like I immediately have to make the very time-sensitive trek out to Ancona’s upon hearing my in-laws will be joining us for dinner, change is hard and I’m tired and — newsflash — as complacent as I am complicit in the cat’s tail being this very off-shade of chartreuse.
Nothing is organized. Nothing is Kondo-ed and that condo feels about as far off as Milo washing up, bare chested and beach kissed with a bottle of Bread and Butter Chardonnay and possibly some defrosted disinfectant on my front porch. All lusting and lack of organization aside, while I’d really love more than anything to be that 128-ounce water bottle half-full kinda girl, the odds feel about as great as lattes-for-life, which roughly works out to 10 in 2.7 million (and yes, I did Google it).
I finally get my coffee cued up, my kids out the door and my “gym clothes” on (please just look the other way if you ever see me in this get up), then call my mom on the phone to relay the whole green-tailed cat, frozen spray cleaner-caper along with a brief debriefing on the monotony of marriage, raising children and why life is just a series of spilled Epsom salts and resolutions meant to broken, and I’m really feeling like, finally … someone is getting this, getting me and my maternal angst and lack of supportive spandex. Finally, someone understands my case of the mistaken orange juice and candy corn addiction and Milo-longing. Thank you, Mom! Finally, finally I feel heard.
Silence. “Mom, are you there … Mom?”
“So wait … you mean you can’t put K-Cups in the Nespresso machine?”
Columnist Lesley Kirschner grew up quiet, in the woods, and devoid of siblings so her hobbies quickly became reading, writing, and talking to inanimate objects. She also spent a considerable amount of time doing voice-overs for her dolls and watching too much daytime television–channel 3, sometimes channel 8, if the weather was good and the antenna wasn’t acting up. She was in attendance at school, graduated from a very much not notable college not worth mentioning, and was transplanted to Wilton with her husband, Ambler Farm‘s Farmer Jonathan and their (baby makes) three children almost a decade ago. Although she never quite found her calling in life, other than perhaps the doll voice-overs, which in hindsight were eerily convincing, she’s happy to try her hand at writing and is thankful for the support and community she found on Facebook’s Buy Nothing Wilton. Lesley realizes while this is all very exciting, she’s not winning a Pulitzer so she’ll wrap it up and be quiet. She’s had a lot of practice.