Ice Cream Romance

This week was brutal. I look the same in the mirror, but on the inside, I am merely just remnants of the person I was on Monday. Still, my day is not over as I grab a shopping cart and walk into my local grocery store. I have wanted a glass of merlot since noon. However, instead of beelining to the wine isle, my crushed ego and spirit pull me over to where I know you are lurking, the freezer section. I impulsively grab you as I cannot resist your pint sized chocolatey and peanut butter goodness and I head to the checkout line.

As I put your container on the belt in preparation to pay, I find myself not being able to take my eyes off you, and I flirt by wiping a piece of ice that’s hanging off your handsome lid. I know it’s pretty forward of me, but I cannot resist the urge to have contact with your beauty. On the ride home, it’s quiet between us, but electric with anticipation. I park, walk inside as I softly cradle you, my sweet gem, in my hand. I grab the only accessory that will bring us closer, a spoon.

I dig in softly and try to play off the huge greedy spoonful I lift to my lips. The rush of sugar almost makes up for the beating that I took from work this week. Before I know it, I go in for spoonful number two, and then three. By spoonful seven, I feel my behind already getting bigger, but don’t care… and then I lose count of the lifting and raising of the spoon, realizing a third of the container has already vanished.

I try to talk myself into slowing down, but the urge and desire to be filled overrides all rationale. My pace gets quicker and more deliberate as I jam spoonful after spoonful into my mouth. I try not to let my mind veer off to judge my actions and try to remain present, but mindless in this act of selfishness and gluttony. As quick as it started it was over and the pint expelled all of its contents into my stomach.

The feelings of guilt are almost immediate. I feel so ashamed and disgusted I went all the way on the first date. I was hoping to savor you, getting to know you slowly over the week to come. Understanding my behavior needs to be punished, I already start the mental trial that must convict, sentence, and punish me for my lack of control. I decide my sentence is 5 to 10, not years, but miles that I will force myself to run in the morning.

For now, I look deeply at the emptiness of your container, reliving all that we shared in such a short time. I wish for some sort of future that is not based only on attraction, lust and piggishness. I recall how we first met and the captivating glare of the grocery store lights and how they drew me in, giving me no choice but to take you home with me. I walk aimlessly around my home cradling your container with a sinking feeling in my stomach knowing that this relationship is just not healthy for me.

I lack all self-control being in the same space with you and worry about what this continued recklessness will do to my mind and body. I become anxious about what might be growing inside, I mean, on me… as I take a gander at my ass in the mirror. I sigh deeply and walk you to the kitchen and place your empty canister on the counter. I hesitate for a moment and think of what could have been.

I realize I don’t know anything at all about you, and what you happen to be made of. I have a fleeting moment of optimism, thinking that if I take the time to really get to know what all of your contents are, maybe that might give me hope of some sort of happily ever after. I pull you closer and try to read you. However, you might as well be from mars, because I don’t understand at all what REALLY makes you who you are and give up.

I take out my phone and snap a quick photo of you so I can burn your sweet memory into my brain, and this picture will help me find one of your relatives in the store next time for maybe one more impulsive rendezvous. As I am in mid thought, I recognizing that I’m a complete and utter slut to have such a notion. Finally, I muster up the gumption to take you, your container, the carcass of our relationship, and place it softly in my trash can. I gently place my napkin over your still, empty vessel and close the lid over top.