Unemployment Object Memoirs: A Tribute to Pre-Packaged Meal

I decided to write thank you notes to the various objects that are helping me get through unemployment. This edition is dedicated to Pre-Packaged Meal.

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Dear Pre-Packaged Meal,

After a visit to the doctor last week, (webmd.com), I made the alarming discovery that my normal meals of wine and Vitamin D provide less than 1 percent of my required daily nutritional value. Since microwave is still dead, and I have trouble remembering how to chop vegetables, I decided to saunter (the word “walk” is still boring) down the street and see what ready-made food options are available these days.

Buying food is hard, Pre-Packaged Meal! I tried going into restaurants, but they require so much from their customers, like tipping and wearing shoes! So I decided to go to the grocery store, since I see barefooted wannabe yoga gurus and idiots wearing “Toms” in winter go in there all of the time.

After wandering around for a few minutes, I finally found what I was looking for: the salad bar, which conveniently has all kinds of food, except for salads. I grabbed a box, starting piling food in, and then looked up. $8.99/pound!? WTF, are you kidding me!? I am trying to make up for 9 months of no nutritional value with a net worth of 5 dollars, not including student loan debt and bad bets on “Toy Story 3” winning the Oscar. What kind of madness is this – requiring I measure how much I eat!? We don’t do portion control, this is America!

So there I stood, salad bar box in one hand, overly complicated phone calculator in the other hand, trying to figure out the correct ratio of brownies to cookies to peas. It’s important to keep a balanced meal and all. I looked at the happily deluded grad students, trust fund babies, and Wall Street fat cats fill their salad bar boxes without a care in the world. Their steady source of cash meant contents and portions were of no concern. Two hours later, and all I had figured out was two cookies = one brownie = 40 peas = God that shit looks gross. Clearly this salad bar nonsense was not meant for those of us debilitated by a case of unemployment.

That’s when I saw you, Pre-Packaged Meal. You have been absent from my life for so long. Our last encounter was in the third grade, when I thought Lunchable pizza was the coolest invention on earth. I now know that I spent two years eating cardboard topped with ketchup, but considering Lunchables provided more nutritional value than my current diet, I suppose I can’t judge. Finally equipped with you, Pre-Packaged Meal, I walked to the cashier with the confidence that I am once again taking care of my inner being. Unemployment will not destroy my body, it will only destroy my mind!

As I got my last $5 to pay for you, a sign caught my eye:

“Wine on sale. $5.”

But no matter, I knew that you were the one thing my body needed, so I stood strong, and bought you. And now that I am back home safely walking without shoes, I can enjoy you, Pre-Packaged Meal, once and for all. It turns out that you are a 2008 Merlot, and quite liquidly. I bet you’d go well with Vitamin D!

Cheers,

Mala