Old Appliances

Once upon a time,

When I was very young,

I looked upon my avocado colored appliances

   with joyful pride.

My shiny refrigerator, so "avante garde,"

Brightening my kitchen with a light

That reflected on to the same color oven door

Where I baked the children's cookies.

But moving took me away from the kitchen set,

Gave me instead an old Sub Zero that smiled 

With its gleeful huge wood-paneled door.

And though quite old,

It happily substituted for the shiny avocado one,

Doing its job while plodding away for 20 years and more

As I refused to part with

One who had morphed into

An old friend,  

Reliably ready when the children

Reached inside for their after school snack

Of milk and cookies.

Gone are those days of dependably seeing the children.

Fragmented memories remain,

Like those of the old Sub Zero,

Replaced now with jet black GE's,

A matching set taking on the role,

No children's fingerprints to mar their glaze.

They stand alone… waiting. 

© Shelly Sitzer, 2015

"Landscape with Refrigerators"
Painting by Kida Kinjiro
from Wikimedia Commons