This morning, I woke up to the sound of my roommate making breakfast. It took me longer than it should have to realize that this was actually the case for two reasons: First, my roommate doesn’t cook. For her, calling for pizza is making dinner. Second, she usually doesn’t wake up until noon, and when she does, her first meal of the day is a slice of cold pizza from the night before. I don’t know if she’s cooked breakfast in her life. Nevertheless, at 7 o’clock this morning, that’s exactly what she was trying to do.
Bleary-eyed, I opened my door to survey the damage. My roommate was hovering over the stove, muttering something under her breath about the person who invented breakfast. Apparently she was attempting to cook a pair of eggs through sheer force of will, since the stovetop was clearly still off. A piece of bread sat in the unplugged toaster, and a couple of oranges sat, squashed and dejected, on the counter. I wondered if she had been trying to make juice. Then she turned and noticed me watching her.
“The toast is a lie!” she yelled, furious.
“What?” I managed in reply.
“I put the bread in the toaster, push the lever down, it pops back up, and I still have bread! I want toast! If I wanted bread, I would not have put it in the toaster!” With that, she smacked the toaster, sending it reeling across the counter.
That’s the thing about my roommate. If I were faced with my own incompetence in a similar fashion, I would likely dissolve into a weeping mess. My roommate ignored her shortcomings and instead viewed the unfolding events as clear indications of mutiny among the appliances. Further, she decided that it was her duty to whip the appliances back into line. I know better than to interfere at that point, and, given that she hadn’t asked for help, I returned to my room to get dressed.
When I emerged, everything was as she left it, but my roommate was nowhere in sight. I found her in bed, fast asleep, and left her there to contemplate my own breakfast. Nothing had actually been cooked, but she had managed to crack the eggs, and I didn’t want them to go to waste. I turned on the stove, plugged in the toaster, and peeled an orange. All in all, it beat my usual bowl of cereal.
I stuck my head into her room before I left. “Thanks for breakfast,” I said softly.
I can’t be sure, but she may have replied, “You’re welcome.”
Hours later, I returned from class to find her once again in the kitchen, looking at all the dishes that I hadn’t had a chance to clean. Confused, she turned to me, “I had the strangest dream last night…”
I could only laugh.
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