The Big Deal

I have been thinking quite a lot lately about Kate Middleton and her path to Buckingham Palace.  What must have passed through her head the first time she realized that it was the future King of England - and not just some schlub with a funny accent (though we now know that the two are not mutually exclusive) - who had asked her out for some fish and chips.  When it occurred to her that her art history degree (with honors) was besides the point.  When she knew for certain that she wouldn't be selling party favors over the Internet like her mum and daddy.

In other words, when she realized that she was A Big Deal.

Coming from poor, yet hearty Norwegian stock (my father was a fishmonger, my mother sold Viking souvenirs at Epcot) I knew I was probably destined for nothingness, unless I committed a major crime or fell into frigid water while ice-fishing, surviving long enough underwater to have a medical condition named after me.  Neither one of these situations panned out and I found myself as an adult in the New York metropolitan area looking for the break that would thrust me into the spotlight.  But it never arrived, probably because I still smelled of fish.

This morning, for example, I knew that I wasn't a Big Deal when I woke up, looked at my social calendar, and saw nothing but a notation that I needed to go out and buy a set of measuring cups, because the printed sizes (1/4 cup, 1/2 cup, 1 cup) had faded from the ones I bought about 15 years ago at a Tupperware party.  And a cup of salt is VERY different from a 1/4 cup of salt, especially when you're grinding it into an open wound or baking brownies.

Similarly, yesterday, I suspected that I wasn't A Big Deal because I went to bed on Friday night with my sink stacked high with pots and pans, and found they were still there when I woke up in the morning.  Had I been A Big Deal, someone dressed in a nice suit would have appeared in my kitchen during the night, cleaned up the mess in the sink and left me a little note in a beautiful cursive flanked by a red rose.

It doesn't bother me that I'm not A Big Deal because I have a beautiful new set of measuring cups.  Here's a photo of the ones I bought at Target:

I had wanted to buy them in blue, to match my kitchen, but they didn't have that color in stock.  And because I'm hearty and bounce back quickly from disappointment, that's okay with me.  It's not such A Big Deal.