Finally, it was time to pull the plug. Now a bright, new refrigerator is in the kitchen. Our old, grungy, faithful one waits in the garage. When you couldn't sleep in the middle of the night, the old fridge was there, waiting with a glass of milk. In times of stress, there was always a half-gallon of ice cream.
Children grow old and leave the nest.
Friends come and go. Through it all, the refrigerator was always there, waiting to offer a sympathetic pork chop or a heaping bowl of chocolate marshmallow fudge nut. Two dozen years' worth of nicks and scratches from toddler pull-toys. On the door, faint traces of a black felt pen where somebody drew a huge TV screen, briefly used for Campbell Kids performances. A crack on the door sill where somebody dropped a pop bottle, hurrying to refill the punch bowl at a high school graduation party.