My mother’s refrigerator was jam-packed—with jam and every other foodstuff that could be crammed onto its shelves. “Please find me some black olives,” she’d say and I would dive into the chaos.
“We have three jars of black olives,” I would finally announce. “Two are moldy.”
“Oh, goodness,” she’d say, as if surprised—though she had bought the jars herself. “Throw them away before your father gets home.”
Inheriting my father’s frugality, I keep a spartan refrigerator. At any given moment, I know exactly what’s in it and, if I can’t see the back wall, I get anxious.
My daughter has had the opposite reaction. “I always feel hungry when I look in our refrigerator,” she used to say and I tried to explain about the jars of moldy olives.
Now she’s an adult and keeps a refrigerator that looks just like my mother’s. Opening the produce drawer, I see the same green peppers that I saw the last time I was there.
The Bible says that the sins of the fathers are visited upon their children and their children’s children. Mothers, too, evidently. I thought I could just clean it up and fix the problem; I didn’t realize how long the leftovers would last.