Meals for One

It’s 8 pm on a Saturday night.

You’re an almost 39 year old woman, and recently decided to change your entire life.

Again.

Currently, every part of who you are is still half in boxes and half cluttering the 700 square feet of space you call your new home in your old hometown.

You spent the day unpacking.

Moving is an odd thing, chapters of your life laid before you as you organize the bracelet you bought after the cancer battle, your favorite coffee mug that you found in your favorite beachside shop after your divorce, the framed Master’s Degree you worked your ass off to get, the family photograph that includes exes, the refrigerator magnet bought on a mountain trip with him, the angel your best friend gifted you– Every memory- good and bad and mundane- that you’ve collected and kept as the years have passed, somehow fits. You see them in the crows' feet framing the dark circles under your eyes as you check the mirror before running to the store, too.

You haven’t eaten dinner yet, and your grumbling stomach knows that waiting for delivery isn’t an option tonight.

At the grocery store across the street from your home, you park near a street light and see another lone woman do the same. You reach for the same small hand basket, and you cordially wave for her to take it. You pick up the next and wipe it down, using an extra wipe on your hands.

You head to the wine aisle, and find her there, too. She’s by the blush, and you’re picking up your favorite bottle of cabernet. Then, you head to the familiar meals-for-one section near the deli. She’s there, too. And when a tall man with dark hair and broad shoulders walks past, you both glance at his left hand, just as his wife turns the corner with a shopping cart holding a toddler riding shotgun, and tells him she found the eggs. You and the other woman turn to the meals-for-one selections and make eye contact for the first time.

A smile spreads across both your faces, the crows feet framing her dark circles reflect yours, and she sees herself reflected in you, too.

You are both standing in front of meals-for-one at 8 pm on Saturday night, and under the bright fluorescent grocery store lights next to the soft hum of the refrigerated cooler and distant checkout beeps, you are both completely exposed.

Neither of you have anyone getting eggs in the next aisle, nor do you have a tall man with dark hair and broad shoulders waiting at home to cook them for you and your non-existent children in the morning. Most of the time, you are both content with the lives you’ve created for yourselves. Other times you question how you got here, and the loneliness permeates every part of your being, only releasing itself it the tears that salt your cabernet .

You don’t need to say a word to know you’ll both go home to separate 700 square foot spaces and you’ll turn on your favorite sitcom reruns, and eat your meals, and sip your wine, and exhale. Because truthfully, you both do know how you got here– For you, it’s half in boxes and half cluttering your new home in your old home town.

And you’ll both smile to yourselves because for just a moment, in the meals-for-one section of a grocery store at 8 pm on a Saturday night, someone really saw you for the first time in a long time, and said, “me too,” with no more than their eyes, a smile, and a nod.