Life in lockdown was going ok until he ate my cookie.
I’d been looking after our toddler all morning until BFG emerged from bed. It was 10am. I’d been up for four hours and done three hours of childcare. I’d said the word ‘tractor’ with affirmative enthusiasm many times. I was ready for a snack.
The day before I’d bought a bag of four large baked cookies from the Co-op. We’d enjoyed one each the previous day. I went to the cupboard to find the bag gone.
‘Where are the cookies?’ I shouted through to the dining room, trying to suppress a sense of rising panic.
‘I ate them’ BFG shot back, immediately contrite. He knew the severity of the situation.
I didn’t reply. I slumped down beside the washing machine, shut my eyes and counted to ten. Then twenty. Then thirty. The rage wasn’t lessening.
BFG was shouting my name in enquiring concern, ‘Nic? Nic?’
I was shaking my head. Eventually, attempting to speak in a measured tone, ‘Why did you eat my cookie? There were two left. When did you eat them?’
‘I ate one last night and one this morning’.
Now BFG was starting to move from contrition to exasperation and self-justification. Clearly he thought I’d gone too far in making him feel bad.
‘I only ate one more cookie than I should have’.
Was he gaslighting me?
I left the house to go shopping. Driving away, I thought, ‘You ate three times more cookies than me’. The stories we tell ourselves. Both true.
By the time I’d returned home from the farm shop - laden with treats to survive the week ahead - I’d calmed down. Matters were somewhat put in perspective by the fact that I had to wait outside the store for twenty minutes in the cold as they operated a one-in one-out policy with everyone stood two metres apart. It was a little eerie and a potent reminder that a stolen cookie is small fry right now.
I reflected that I could have handled the situation better. In fact, it could have been the perfect chance to trial a new approach to dealing with such scenarios. A home-working couple recently shared some advice (perhaps it was on Twitter) about how to handle domestic irritations. It struck me as a golden solution. So here it is: invent an imaginary third housemate and blame everything on them. I’m going for Gary. So I could have said, ‘Bloody hell, looks like Gary has eaten my cookie! What a dick!’ - and BFG could have nodded in collegiate disgust, and maybe shot back, ‘I know, and Gary left the bathroom floor in a wet mess this morning - he’s so selfish’. This tantalising transference seems capable of defusing tension with humour. I’m going to give it a go next time I start counting to ten.