I moved into my parents’ old house last month. My parents left expecting to return, so I found the cupboards stocked, beds made, potatoes in their basket, germinated with long shoots.
I have not bought anything other than a few vegetables, some milk. The rice smells musty, but I wash away the dust and cook it for a long time with dried garlic and lemon. I saw a weevil in the jar of flour the other day, but none in my cup so I made the pancakes anyway. I opened a bag of roasted cashew nuts and noticed the powdery fungus all over them due to the bitter taste. It was the one of the few items I threw out. I have had a stomach-ache all month long— some days are better than others, when I have to lay straight down my bed and wait for the aching to pass. I am not an environmentalist nor a miser, but it feels important to eat all that remains here before shopping for new stock.
Last week, my friend came over and I served him some biscuits from the cupboard. He made a face after his first bite, but he did not make a comment. He just ate the rest of the biscuit. I thought about apologising but I could think of nothing to say by way of an explanation. I had enough money to buy good food. So I avoided making eye contact while we ate and offered my acknowledgment of the off biscuit by just gnawing on the biscuit. It was so embarrassing. I hope he will return.
The other day, I saw a rat in the spare room, which was bewildering because I have never seen a rat in this house, even when everyone lived here, ate here. I checked the kitchen on my first day and none of the food packets in the kitchen had been damaged in the year that they had just sat here. I have been fastidious about washing and cleaning. The day after, I saw some rat droppings in the bathroom attached to the spare room, but nothing to indicate that it had made its way to the kitchen or living room.
Last night, my stomachache became the worst it has been so far. In the evening, I opened a packet of roasted chickpeas to snack on while watching TV on my laptop. I woke up in the middle of the night, choking, feeling as if my stomach had become lead. I wasn’t diarrhetic nor did I feel nauseous, but my stomach had atrophied . My limbs were icy. The only way I got through the night was by continually sipping on hot green tea.
A week after starting my clean-up of the kitchen stocks, I had started taking fibre supplements from my mother’s medicine cabinet. This morning, I took a double dose and a few hours ago, I finally felt the urge to go to the bathroom and was thankfully immediately relieved of the pain. I did have to lie down for a few hours to start feeling normal again.
Looking in the kitchen now, there isn’t much left. The last of the rice and flour, some packets of airline salted almonds, a case of guava juice in shelf stable tetra packaging, a box of tricolour quinoa that my mother had bought in search of healthy alternatives, a few brittle bay leaves, some banana chips from the South Indian fast-food joint. The jars of dusty turmeric, coriander powder, chili powder are still quite full. I think they can be reasonably excluded from my detox.
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