Schrodinger’s Pepper

When I moved into my first apartment, there was a dried pepper in one of the drawers in the kitchen. I thought it was bizarre. It wasn’t like it was tucked way back in the drawer. It was up near the front, fully visible. So strange. I remember deciding to get rid of it before filling that drawer with silverware.

When I moved out of my first apartment, there was a dried pepper in that same drawer in the kitchen. I had never removed it. I don’t know what I was thinking leaving it in there for those two years, if I left it in for a profound reason or maybe as a prank on my later self. Perhaps I was just lazy or I simply forgot. My memory of tossing it was probably just wrong.

I did throw it out then before saying goodbye to that space. I didn’t want them to see it during our security deposit check (though obviously they had missed it before we moved in).

But now I have a new theory about the appearance of that pepper. Maybe, just maybe, I did throw it away when we first moved in. Maybe that particular drawer just generates dried peppers. And if that’s true, that means that the next people to live there had the same baffling experience that I did. I kind of like the idea of that space forcing people into a unifying discovery. I kind of like the idea that my memories may happen once again.

So cheers to Schrodinger’s pepper that may or may not be in that drawer. I’ve decided which option I want to believe in, and it’s the unlikely one, full of whimsy and universality.

Photo by Karolina Grabowska from Pexels