Retirement Does Have Its Rewards

Here I am again, ready to solve one of the world’s greatest problems.

Every time I open the door of the refrigerator, I’m unhappy with what I see. At least that’s been my reaction for most of this year. And it’s not the contents – I think our dietary habits are just fine – but the arrangement.

“I don’t think we’re getting the best storage capacity out of our refrigerator,” I announced to JoAnna last night. “I think I just found myself an end-of-year project.”

“Good for you,” she said, in a wifely, disinterested tone.

What else should I have expected? It’s not the type of project for which one is pressed for details.

“Will the peanut butter be next to the jellies?” she asked breathlessly.

The refrigerator’s interior was due for a thorough cleaning and clearing out anyway. In the latter category, for example, I tossed out the contents of glass jars of olives, capers, and tapenade purchased for Bastille Day 2008. (Note to guests: we always use the freshest ingredients available.)

After recreating a sparkling interior, I replaced contents that had survived the cut by like or related items, though sadly, due to a mismatch in container sizes, the peanut butter did not end up with the jellies.

My first determination, which occurred to me in a daydream in Sunday, was to store the beverages – milk, pitcher of water, and fruit juices – on the lowest door shelf, as these are the items most frequently accessed. Then I placed individual containers of yogurt and applesauce, Eddie’s favorite snacks, on the right-hand side of the top interior shelf. These items had previously been stored on a jellyroll pan on a lower shelf, an improvisation I was never all that happy with. Now they are nicely stacked, in full view, easily retrievable. (Check back with me in a month or so to learn if this is still the case.)

After these two clusters had been reshelved, the rest of the reorganization almost took care of itself.

Retirement does have its rewards.