Hunger - Marigrace Bannon

Why is it you can remember hunger and not all the times you were satiated and content? Is that just the human nature aspect? Sure I remember no food in the house, when some people say that they might have crackers. Crackers? We never had crackers. But no food means no food, maybe a mayonnaise jar, Hellman’s of course and some mustard. I do remember some mayonnaise sandwiches until the day old white bread ran out. There were those three days of candy corns, nowhere near Halloween, in fact I think it was summertime and these candy corn were wrapped in individual cellophane wrappers and were definitely a manufacturer’s holdover, but for a few sickeningly sweet three days those little orange triangles were our sustenance. Another no food in the house memory. I think my mother called my grandmother and it was the same day, Kathleen was invited to a birthday party and we had family plans for her. She wore a pair of overalls, which fortunately were fashionable for girls those days, a kind of anti fashion statement, and they had so many pockets in which she knew she needed to fill and bring home the goods. She stuffed those pockets with potato chips and Oreo cookies. It wasn’t feasible to put cake in those pockets, not with the icing and all. I don’t know if anyone watched her stuff her pockets, but she blithely skipped home to share the goods. But in the interim my grandmother arrived with 2 brown A&P bags. And by the time Kathleen arrived home we already had at least 2 Bologna and cheese sandwiches and her confiscated crushed potato chips and broken Oreos held no allure.