Jessica Furseth’s previous work for The Toast can be found here.
Having no one to help carry grocery bags home, that was the worst part of breaking up with my boyfriend of nearly five years. Or should I say, that was the worst part as far as I can remember it now, an eternity later. All the other stuff about breaking up with the first person I ever loved was pretty much as you’d expect, in all the shades of hellishness. But it’s not really the sleeping alone that gets you, because you are ready for that one. It’s that second it takes to remember that you can no longer just text them when something funny happens. It’s the first time at the grocery shop, when everything’s bagged up and you realise there’s no one there to help you carry.
I got the hang of solo grocery shopping eventually: buy what you need, but never more than two bags’ worth. Or if you don’t need that much, throw in a couple of non-perishables to fill up the bags, to save having to haul that weight later. Pasta and tomato sauce featured heavily for many years. There was that period of lots of hummus with bread, preferably white crust. There was one week where I lived mostly on prawn crackers, which ended sharply after they made me sick, literally. Lots of Chinese food, later Vietnamese, then Thai. All kinds of fruit, as it requires no preparation. I rarely cooked – nothing decent anyway, as I associated food preparation with couplehood: roasted meats, creamy curries, grilled fish with spicy rice. Still, I ate something at almost every meal. Occasionally I’d wrap a salmon fillet in foil with some leek, pretending for a moment I was a grown up who ate proper meals. But I couldn’t fool myself for long, as I secretly wished for that three-course-meal chewing gum that Willy Wonka gave to Violet Beauregarde. I mean, it would be so much easier.
If this sounds sad, that’s not the way it felt. I was preoccupied with other things, and just didn’t think about food very much. Ok, that week of prawn crackers was a low point, I’ll admit. But most of the time my mind was simply elsewhere as I added pesto to my pasta and ate it hurriedly, while getting ready to go out. Food was fuel, or a layer to go under the alcohol, which I only drank in moderate amounts anyway. Except for that one year when I accidentally gave up booze altogether, something I never planned for but all of a sudden I looked back and realised it had been a teetotal year.
Instead, I developed a slight addiction to Maltesers that year. That’s the chocolate with the malt honeycomb centre, which popped so pleasingly in the mouth as the chocolate melted. I’d get a small packet every day, not trusting myself with the cheaper-by-the-pound bigger pack in the house. I only managed to break the addiction by going on a three-week trip to Portugal, which turned out to be a Maltesers-free space. Something similar happened a couple of years later with Maynards winegums, the release from which I owe to a month in Australia. I am, would seem, a creature of habit.
But there’s always some substance, some particular flavour or texture, that manages to slip through and take hold. My latest thing is this particular ginger beer, made by Bundaberg. The non-alcoholic drink is sold in a stubby brown bottle with a old-school pull-off cap, and while it’s not uncommon around my parts it can be tricky to find. It comes in packs of four at the big grocery shop near my house, but lately they haven’t had it in stock. I scour the aisle nervously every time I go there, hoping it will be there this time, but the ginger drought continues. Each time I check the label signalling its place on the shelf hasn’t been removed, but it seems that someone is playing a trick.
It was my birthday recently, and my husband me asked what I wanted to do. After thinking about it I realised that what I really wanted was to get in the car and go for a drive, to see if we could find some of that Bundaberg. It was sunny, as it always is on my birthday, and we drove with the windows open through back roads into leafy neighborhoods, the kinds that may appreciate a fancy bottle of ginger beer. Not that it was really about the ginger beer anymore. Still, we were rewarded with four packs; I’m drinking each bottle slowly, and once they’re gone I probably won’t buy any more. Not because they are too heavy to carry, or too hard to find, as marriage fixed those problems. Not marriage in itself, I should add, as it wouldn’t work with just anyone, but marriage to the right person, that fixed a lot.
Having a car to bring groceries home in, that’s one of the best things about getting married. Or should I say, that’s the best part out of the things I anticipated, especially as it’s so rare to meet someone who owns a car in this city. All the other stuff about getting married to someone you love more than anyone was pretty much as you’d expect, in all the shades of amazingness. Because it’s not sleeping in the same bed as someone else that gets you, as you are ready for that one. It’s the first time at the grocery shop, where you can get a trolley and not a basket, and you can get anything you want because you know that when everything’s bagged up, it’s not just you anymore. There’s someone there to cook with: tomato soups, peanut butter fudge, a whole grilled chicken. You no longer have to carry all the bags yourself.
According to my Australian BFF, Bundaberg is the unofficial drink of edge kids in Brisbane so I ended up drinking a lot of it whilst over there.
This…this really hit home for me. I split with my boyfriend of four and a half years in March and there are still so many things I haven’t quite gotten back to doing yet. Frozen burritos, macaroni and cheese, hummus and pretzel chips…if I’m feeling ambitious, stir-fry. I know things will get better, and to steal some Chobits-speak I’ll find my Someone Just For Me…but it’s still a bit rough in the meantime.
Thank you. <3
Good thoughts your way, and also Chobits, yes!!
4.5 years just ended in September for me! We can form a club! (the weeping club)
This was such a sweet little piece, although if you are in the middle, there’s a terrible temptation to say, “congratulations. how wonderful.” Especially since the car was his…
But yeah, dinner. How do you do dinner for reals for one?
Salad and Omelette
I read this as “sad omelette” and was like, “whoa, too soon.”
10.5 years ended for me in August. Card carrying weeping club member here (the tears are inside). I make a lot of the same stuff and just eat it multiple times. I haven’t had the old urge to try experimenting in the kitchen yet, and some things my ex loved are still off limits. Also, I never bake anymore, which is something I really love. I’m sure we’ll get there, right?
Yeah, I think I’ll probably try hosting dinner parties to get in the groove eventually. Feels like a lot of work for one.
That sounds like such a great idea. I have a standing dinner date with a friend that spurs me to cook nicer things than I would make for myself. The standing-date thing is great because instead of blathering about how we should get together, we just look at the calendar and pick a day every month.
Bundaberg: Australian for ginger beer.
It is wonderful, but kinda weird to hear it described as “fancy”. It was just what we drank all the time as kids!
You’re right – it’s not fancy, but it can be tricky to find outside Australia! I first discovered it in Melbourne, where I had a “Bundies” every day for a week (sooooo much sugar) and went into sharp withdrawal after leaving. Such a treat.
My partner and I were long distance for 3 years, now living together, and one of the things I love the most is having someone else to go grocery shopping with! And being able to ring him up and say ‘can you pick up this on your way home’? Having someone else around for the day to day stuff makes life SO MUCH easier. I find it a lot less stressful, just knowing there’s someone there to pick up the slack if needed.
NB Flatmates/friends/family can play that role of course, I just wasn’t lucky enough to have that for a while
Co-sign. I think back on the two years we were long distance as the Years of Takeout. I still went to the supermarket and cooked food for myself, but it seemed so pointless and I had the Indian place on speed-dial anyway, so…
Now going to the grocery store with my spouse has its challenges–I’m just beginning to work through some major emotional issues around food and decision-making, which I can do now because I feel safe with him seeing these things–but coming home and unloading the groceries together and planning meals around how we’re going to use leftovers? So lovely.
I recently tweeted “There are better things about marriage than having someone who will bring you a cookie, but that’s hard to beat.”
I know it sounds flippant, but it wasn’t. When you’ve spent years alone, or spent years with people who second-guess even your simplest desires, or spent years with partners who use the smallest favor as a bargaining chip, that is a lot.
Knowing that if I asked my husband to stop on his way home from work and bring me a cookie, he not only would, he’d be delighted to do some little thing to make me day brighter? That’s not a small thing. That’s enormous.
p.s., he brought home two bakery boxes full of cookies. What an overachiever.
I’ve never lived in a large city, so the carrying of groceries has always been a minor annoyance rather than a Herculean effort. Still, even though I have a live-in fella, we have opposite schedules most days. Food schlepping is all on me, since I have the car. But it does seem a tad unfair that I have to buy enough for two, and then I have to carry it all in to the house myself. What’s the point in having a fella around at all, is the question I find myself asking on the regular. I’d just get another cat, but canned cat food is heavy too. #jokingnotjokingseriouslythoughI’mjokingprettymuch
The Beloved rolls his eyes at me because I refuse to make more than one trip into the house after a grocery-shopping trip (unless it’s a trip from Costco and then my wisdom overrides my vanity). Once I weighed myself with all the bags of groceries hanging from my shoulders (I use big reuseable shopping bags with sturdy straps–that helps). Eighty pounds of groceries. I felt like such a fucking badass. SCHLEP IT WITH PRIDE, YO.
You are a Goddess but srsly, does no one have one of those lovely little wheeled carts that perfectly hold one bag of groceries but can stuff two bags? A bag enclosure on wheels, with a drawstring to close up the top and a pouch on the side for house keys. They are perfect and I can walk to the store and bump it up the stairs once home, and feel vaguely French while doing it?
Little wheeled carts, people.
This was cute, and nice, and now I really want a ginger beer.
This is a lovely little piece! I wonder how the Bundaberg would be in a Dark & Stormy…
it is delicious and a treasure.
I’ve spent the last ten years living in big (or biggish) cities without a car. I have never quite learned to only buy what I can comfortably carry home from the grocery store. I’m perpetually single and don’t know if that’ll ever change, but having someone to help carry groceries is one of those perks of coupledom that I think I would enjoy almost as much as having someone to love and cuddle with. It’s like having someone with you to watch your bag at the airport while you go to the bathroom instead of having to haul everything with you. It’s a small perk, but oh so nice.
Oh my god, long distance travelling WITH someone to watch your bags is not a small perk it is THE BEST PERK.
HUGE PERK. I actually quite like travelling by myself but man, the luggage schlepping.
This piece gave me a really warm feeling– as an aro/ace person, I know I won’t have (and have never really wanted) a long-term relationship in the romantic sense, but little vaguely domestic things like grocery shopping and cooking (well, trying to cook) together mean a lot to me. Understated gestures that remind you you’re not alone are always the best kind.
Now I have the worst craving for Maltesers. American chocolate-covered malt balls like Milk Duds are disgusting.
See, Milk Duds in Canada are (ETA: pretty tasty) chocolate-covered caramel. Whoppers are what we have here that are chocolate-covered malt balls. Canadian-American candy differences: so weird!
LeslieMonster, I think Keythah meant to write “Whoppers,” since Milk Duds and Whoppers are exactly the same in the US and Canada. The big candy difference between the two countries is that the US has no Coffee Crisp. Which is just horrible for those of us who live here.
It was probably easy to confuse Whoppers and Milk Duds because they’re both revolting, but have delicious non-American counterparts (i.e., Maltesers and Fantales).
coffee crisp is so good! my friend broke up with her canadian girlfriend so there was no coffee crisp this halloween. 🙁
Ah, makes sense.
Also, what you guys call Smarties, apparently we call Rockets. Our Smarties are similar (but not the same!) to M&Ms? Unless that has changed, and you now have smarties.
NAFTA seriously failed you guys, Coffee Crisps are the best.
I just bought one last week and I am definitely in the US (though relatively close to Canada). So there is hope!
I had Whoppers when I was in NYC and they were awful! I had expected them to be like Maltesers, but they were one of the grossest chocolates ever!
I don’t think anyone likes Milk Duds, they’d be less repulsive if they were full of live baby spiders, they’re just stocked in every store as part of some sinister corporate conspiracy.
I will take everyone’s unwanted Milk Duds! I love them. Also: my coworker and her boyfriend call them Milk Dudes which is adorable and my jam.
I also love Whoppers (malted milk balls) and British Smarties (American Smarties are worthless and disgusting).
“You no longer have to carry all the bags yourself”
So true, on so many levels. Beautifully written.
I just got one of those little old-lady basket carts. It’s the epitome of un-cool, but was so much better than hauling my groceries the half hour home from the store every week and my roommates had them too so it wasn’t too bad.
The most unexpected good thing that came out of my first long term relationship break-up was my newfound freedom in cleaning liquids. He really hated the smell of fake lemon, so while we were living together all the dish soaps and whatnot were orange or apple scented. After we broke up I bought all lemon-scented and lavender-scented things for a while because I could. I don’t remember any unexpected bad things about breaking up, which probably says a lot about that relationship.
Love my tartan trolley(little old lay wheeled cart)! Best way to get the heavy shopping home.
this is sweet.
my mom and all her older ladyfriends are divorced broads in their 60s who are like RELATIONSHIPS ARE NO GOOD MEN ARE NO GOOD LESBIANS ARE OKAY I GUESS BUT I PREFER THE PRETTY KIND and I just made public plan to get gaymarried summer 2015 and sometimes I replay fights for them and include the meanest thing that anyone said to anyone in the fight, and they think it is hilarious. (because harsh words between me and my girlfriend are like, “I think you’re being totally unreasonable.”)
Recently one of them was like “your girlfriend is kinda traditional huh” and I was like “yes but you see if it was just me making all these choices I would’ve had a baby named Amaranth and would be living in an Airstream trailer eating dumpstered kale, now I live with somebody who has knives nice enough that she takes them to get sharpened once a year, having nice things is okay.”
So yeah, relationships.
For reference, my all-lady art collective is considering an Airstream for serious since none of us is getting hitched in the near future, and I fully expect an Amaranth to turn up, and someone brought dumpstered kale last week to a thing, so those are all extremely reasonable predictions.
It gives me a great sense of comfort to belong to a distributed community with clear expectations, even if I turned out to be the one who keeps the knives nice. Thanks for sharing this.
I’m in a relationship now that I hope and believe is it, and I find all my old breakups so much more horrifying, because they are somehow proof that this, too, could end. HELP
I love the idea of Bundaberg being a fancy GB.
Right now I am very much in love with carrying the bags by myself. I’ve recently started dating again, and I still don’t want anyone else to come home with me. And maybe that’s about not being ready, and maybe that’s about finally being able to carry them by myself.
I like this. I lived by myself for six years and loved it, despite the heavy bags. Freedom compensates for a lot 🙂
I recently tweeted "There are better things about marriage than having someone who will bring you a cookie, but that's hard to beat."
I know it sounds flippant, but it wasn't. When you've spent years alone, or spent years with people who second-guess even your simplest desires, or spent years with partners who use the smallest favor as a bargaining chip, that is a lot.
Knowing that if I asked my husband to stop on his way home from work and bring me a cookie, he not only would, he'd be delighted to do some little thing to make me day brighter? That's not a small thing. That's enormous.
p.s., he brought home two bakery boxes full of cookies. What an overachiever.
You're right – it's not fancy, but it can be tricky to find outside Australia! I first discovered it in Melbourne, where I had a "Bundies" every day for a week (sooooo much sugar) and went into sharp withdrawal after leaving. Such a treat.
I like this. I lived by myself for six years and loved it, despite the heavy bags. Freedom compensates for a lot 🙂
That sounds like such a great idea. I have a standing dinner date with a friend that spurs me to cook nicer things than I would make for myself. The standing-date thing is great because instead of blathering about how we should get together, we just look at the calendar and pick a day every month.
guys: online delivery.
although not alone, I’m a long-distancer. cereal for dinner happens more often than I’d really like to face up to. the delivery guys are bemused by how much cereal I’m shipping in. whatever – at least it’s not 12 bottles of gin.
(sometimes it’s 12 bottles of gin)
If you can’t get Bundaberg, see if you can get Fevertree Naturally Lighter ginger beer. It’s good.
A lot of this rang true for me, but I am mostly posting to say that I’m an Australian in the UK, and I nearly cried when I found Bundaburg ginger beer in Waitrose.
…then I didn’t buy it because I was povo at the time and couldn’t countenance how much more it cost here. Also I miss the one you get back home that only comes in a 1L brown glad bottle with a Tasmanian devil on the label, because I think it tastes better. Even though I’m betraying my Queensland roots saying that.
A lot of this rang true for me, but I am mostly posting to say that I'm an Australian in the UK, and I nearly cried when I found Bundaburg ginger beer in Waitrose.
…then I didn't buy it because I was povo at the time and couldn't countenance how much more it cost here. Also I miss the one you get back home that only comes in a 1L brown glad bottle with a Tasmanian devil on the label, because I think it tastes better. Even though I'm betraying my Queensland roots saying that.