My hands were a little cold after reaching into the freezer. Just enough to…

I saw it fly off my left hand and shoot under the trash compactor.

Never, ever get a trash compactor. The tray-shaped part that pushes down only pushes down, for obvious safety’s sake, when the door is closed and the machine is off–but ours collects any stray bits that spill over the top of that tray and then the sides that are supposed to thwart trash from getting on top of the pusher now make it so you can’t get them out of there: the space is too narrow and enclosed for a hand to get into or an eye to see well in there.

Imagine a trash can you cannot ever completely clean.

The problem is a blank space in the cabinetry with no way to match the oak.

I wanted my ring back.

No sign of it whatsoever.

After several minutes of trying, he came over and pulled the thing off its runners and into the center of the kitchen. I looked, I scrubbed. No ring.

I took the bag off the compactor, sat on the floor, and went through every single bit in there. No ring.

I looked all around–but I’d seen that thing shoot straight across, where on earth could it be? I pulled out the long thin lines of styrofoam that the compactor had been running back and forth on for 31 years. And they looked like it. I scrubbed them off (I don’t think they were supposed to come out but they were now, whatever was supposed to cover them was long gone), looked under where they’d been, then put them back nice and flat in there. No ring.

Never has a cherry pit nor used sauce packet been so thoroughly inspected.

Finally, I got the trash back in the bag, he got the compactor back on its track, and we tried to get it back in its place.

Past the halfway mark it won’t anymore. So far at least. We both tried. So now it juts halfway into the space where you’re coming into the kitchen and you’d better be paying attention or you’re going to walk right into it. Charming. We have not won that one yet.

I scrubbed my hands a good one again, turned to move around the compactor–

–and stepped on my ring.

Apparently he’d knocked it forward when he’d pulled that thing out and then I’d put the bag on top of it. I got my ring back. I got my ring back. I got my ring back. I considered where it had been and washed my hands again.

While the trash compactor declares that we’ve wanted it gone for so long and now it’s just trying to help us get there. Isn’t that nice of it?