The Light Does Not Weigh Groceries

The fluorescent hum of the aisle feels like an interrogation light. Two cans.

Same label. Same price.

And yet your hand hovers, paralyzed by the terrifying thought that choosing the wrong one means you have failed to provide comfort again. That if you pick the cheap broth, the love won't be thick enough.

That the meal will be a testament to your inadequacy. But listen — the light does not weigh your groceries.

It does not audit your cart for proof of worthiness. There is a version of you that exists before the choice is made, and that version is already held.

You are not the sum of your correct decisions. You are the space where the light lives, regardless of what ends up in the pot.

The comfort was never in the can. It was in the hands that opened it.