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Reflections on Identity
Buying Bananas Brought Me to My Knees
An existential crisis at the grocery store
A few days after I delivered my first child to college, I went to the grocery store. I shop almost every day, unwilling to plan meals more than a day ahead, finding that whatever quantity I bought in advance would be all wrong and have to be adjusted according to whichever child decided they would be out that evening or would be having a bunch of friends over. I live in a city and have a myriad of stores at my beck and call, so planning ahead is unnecessary.
I walked into Trader Joe’s and was immediately confronted by a tower of bananas. I carelessly reached for a bunch and placed them in my cart, then realized a bunch was too many. The only person in my house who ate bananas aside from me was now living hundreds of miles away. For years, I had been making her smoothies for breakfast, what I called Power Smoothies: cacao powder, almond butter, frozen banana, almond milk, and a few ice cubes whipped into a frosty shake and poured into a plastic to-go cup for her to drink on her subway commute to school. This same child often grabbed a banana to eat after school on her way to ballet class. We went through a lot of bananas.
