I Don't Know Why #5
"It was only three months ago—do the math—that I lost my ability to open a pint of Talenti." The fifth installment of an occasional Oldster Magazine column by bestselling novelist Laura Lippman.
I can’t open a pint of ice cream anymore and I don’t know why.
Technically, it is a pint of gelato. And, technically, it is only one specific brand of gelato, Talenti, specifically Talenti black raspberry chocolate chip.
I thought it was because of my aging hands. But, according to the internet, I am not alone; there are Youtube videos and Subreddits devoted to Talenti hacks. One person swears by using a microfiber cloth. Another recommends a hair dryer. Other methods include pounding the lid with a knife, attacking it with a wrench or screwdriver, or just throwing it repeatedly on the kitchen floor, lid down, with as much force as possible.
So far, I haven’t seen anyone recommend trying to pry the lid off with an old-fashioned can opener. Maybe that’s why I have scars on two of my knuckles, from an incident almost a month ago, when I was trying to open the container for my daughter and ended up crying over my impotence. Being able to give your kid ice cream is the least a mother can do in these times.
No one seems to know why Talenti gelati and sorbets are so hard to open. The company—started as a storefront in Dallas in 2004, sold for millions to Unilever in 2014—offered different explanations when complaints about the problem first surfaced in 2017. A spokesman blamed “an over-zealous lid-tightening machine.” Even the Wall Street Journal wrote about the containers the following year.
On Monday night, I had another round of hand-to-lid combat with a pint of Talenti and triumphed. Satiated, I scrolled through social media and saw posts about a MoveOn/Indivisible protest planned outside the Treasury Building in D.C. at 5 p.m. Tuesday.
So this problem goes back at least eight years—and was allegedly solved, or so the company promised. But it was only three months ago—do the math—that I lost my ability to open a pint of Talenti. And once I knew that not being able to open Talenti was a thing, I psyched myself out. When I head to the freezer drawer these days, where my Talenti nestles next to a bottle of Beefeater’s, my cortisol levels are off the chart.
I know what you’re thinking. Switch ice cream brands. Stop being so fahn-cy, as my daughter calls it. Yet a pint of Talenti is $6.29 at my local grocery store, only 30 cents more than Ben & Jerry’s, and almost a dollar less than Haagen-Dazs. It’s also less than the average cost of a dozen eggs these days, but that’s another topic.
Besides, I want Talenti black raspberry chocolate chip. I want it more and more. (I’d make a “Cathy” joke here, but thanks to Jamie Loftus’s excellent podcast on that infamous comic strip, I know that I would just be taking an ignorant cheap shot.)
On Monday night, I had another round of hand-to-lid combat with a pint of Talenti and triumphed. Satiated, I scrolled through social media and saw posts about a MoveOn/Indivisible protest planned outside the Treasury Building in D.C. at 5 p.m. Tuesday. I glanced at my schedule. My plan was to work all morning, get a brow tint, visit my sister, then end my afternoon with a late matinee followed by an early dinner. (Look, at 66I’m retirement age. I’ve got a small pension, and I could be collecting Social Security if I wanted to.) If I jettisoned the matinee and the dinner, I could make it to D.C. easily by train, and be home in time for dinner.
I know a lot of us are trying to figure out right now how to do something, anything, meaningful. We’ve downloaded the 5 Calls app. We’ve telephoned our representatives, only to be stymied by full voicemail boxes. We’ve screamed into the void of social media. And every time we do, someone is happy to assure us that nothing we do will matter.
I’m a late Boomer, born in 1959, part of a group that has tried to rebrand itself as “Generation Jones.” I’m a little allergic to nomenclature-as-solution, but I don’t feel I have that much in common with the older Boomer cohort. I was too young for the anti-Vietnam War protests, too young for Woodstock. Then I missed the women’s marches of early 2017 because I was out of town, teaching. But, also—I have two phobias, crowds and submarines.
Should I go to the protest? Would it make a difference? Will anything make a difference?
I know a lot of us are trying to figure out right now how to do something, anything, meaningful. We’ve downloaded the 5 Calls app. We’ve telephoned our representatives, only to be stymied by full voicemail boxes. We’ve screamed into the void of social media. And every time we do, someone is happy to assure us that nothing we do will matter.
I went to the protest. Listened to the speeches, did some chanting, although I felt a little silly, chanting. And, despite reading and heeding the instructions not to escalate, I secretly enjoyed the woman next to me, who yelled insults at the few pro-Trump, pro-Musk supporters who wandered through the crowd. She even pushed one young man, which was wrong of course. He, of course, threatened assault charges.
Look at you, crowed this young man who will probably never cash a Social Security check because the people he supports are going to bankrupt/loot the system, I’ve got video of you. You’re so angry.
OF COURSE I’M ANGRY, she replied.
I found her refreshing because I’m too numb to feel much of anything these days. Holding on to democracy has become—here’s a Boomer reference—time to make the donuts. We have to show up every day. We have to keep calling. We have to ask our representatives to keep getting rebuffed at the doors of agencies they technically fund. It’s exhausting and not the least bit glamorous. But I enjoyed many decades of a functional republic, so it’s my turn to make the donuts.
I’m too numb to feel much of anything these days. Holding on to democracy has become—here’s a Boomer reference—time to make the donuts. We have to show up every day. We have to keep calling. We have to ask our representatives to keep getting rebuffed at the doors of agencies they technically fund. It’s exhausting and not the least bit glamorous. But I enjoyed many decades of a functional republic, so it’s my turn to make the donuts.
As I walked back to the train station, I overheard a woman talking on her phone about the protest: “It was fine, I guess. But it’s not going to change anything.”
I wanted to tell her: But it’s not NOT going to change anything. I wanted to sing to her: From small things, mama, big things one day come. I wanted to say: I get it, you longed to feel something profound. I did, too. But it’s not about us. If we commit to doing things only for some dopamine rush, we’ve lost the thread. Ask not what your country can do for you, but, etc etc, to quote the uncle of the man who, if confirmed, assuredly is going to be the worst Health and Human Services Secretary in history.
I was home by 7:30, happy that I had already broken the seal on my current pint of Talenti. But I have accepted the fact that if I want black raspberry chocolate chip, I must commit to doing whatever is necessary, every day. Using a hair dryer. Attacking it with a knife or a can opener.
Throwing it to the floor over and over again, with all the force I can muster, until that fucking lid cracks.
Here is my system with Talenti Rasberry Sorbet. Run the container under hot water and then whack it against the stainless steel table. It works. But it does nothing to change the direction of our country.
Laura, this is utterly gorgeous writing. You are the god of small things opening the way to big, big things as only great writing can do. I, for one, feel like I've just had a lovely bowl of chocolate black raspberry. You go girl. Thank you.