Abstractions – Sydney Shimko

At least it’s local

I’m headed to Kopps Frozen custard for the flavor of the day, Mud Pie – Chocolate mocha custard, a ribbon of caramel and Oreo cookies. It’s my favorite flavor, and they only have it once a year. But there’s more too my story than that.

A few years ago, actually about 6 weeks after Maia was born, I had the very unfortunate circumstance of contracting C. Diff. I had just finished a course of antibiotics for mastitis, killing all the good bacteria in my gut and leading to the C. Diff proliferation. By the time I realized how bad off I was and went to the doc, all I could do was wait over the weekend for lab tests to come back. By then it had been almost a week of being unable to eat or drink. Even a sip of broth would cause my stomach to cramp severely. I had my friend an ER doc in MN on speed dial to ask when exactly I should go into the hospital for an IV. Meanwhile, I was still attempting to nurse my newborn. Stubborn and still conscious, I waited it out until the labs came back and a new round of drugs got me back to normal. Thankfully, throughout the week my mom came to stay and help with Maia while I was otherwise mostly incapacitated.

The point of this story, of course, is food. What could I do at the time, but lie on the couch watching the Food Network for hours and days on end!? I reached levels of hunger that I had never before experienced. Sensations made increasingly more interesting by the mind games of watching delicious food prepared and photographed to perfection, while I couldn’t stomach a soda cracker.

On the day I started to get better, Jason came home with Mud Pie from Kopps. I knew better than to eat it right away. In fact the torture of waiting a few more days while able to eat (albeit very simple foods) may have been the greatest. So now, when Mud Pie is up for its annual cameo at Kopps, I don’t miss out.

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