Plastic Bags

Sophie has plenty of storage space throughout her apartment, with her several closets and dressers and cabinets, but she seems to like stashing things in unsuspecting places.

I once asked to borrow a frying pan, and to retrieve it she had to dig underneath her kitchen sink, behind a box of laundry detergent, some old towels, and a miniature bottle of Schnapps. When she eventually pulled it out, she had to spend some time untying the knots she’d made with the handles of each of the three plastic shopping bags encasing the frying pan. For safekeeping.

On another occasion, after I had just brought her some groceries, she was insisting on giving me a tip. I always tell her I don’t need a tip when I go grocery shopping, but she always insists. This time, she said she had it all ready in an envelope for me, but she was having trouble remembering where she put it. So I watched her pull out about six stuffed and knotted plastic bags from behind her armchair, and once she laid them all out on her couch, she started unknotting and going through one at a time. One bag had a purse in it, which actually had another smaller purse inside of it, one bag was full of sweaters, one had a pair of sneakers, and one was full of more plastic bags. She did end up finding the envelope with my tip, and I was thrilled to see that it was $5.50 all in coins.

I was recently chatting with my sister Heidi, who’s also living in Granny Mansion for the summer, and she told me how she had just found a plastic bag full of bras and underwear under a pillow on Sophie’s couch. When she asked Sophie what it was, Sophie replied, “My junk.” And when Heidi asked her why she needed it there, she didn’t have an answer.

Maybe to change into when needed?