Pistachios by Jamie Kirkpatrick

A dear friend came over the other day for a quick glass-of-wine visit. We hadn’t restocked the larder since our return from Florida, so there wasn’t much to offer her in the way of an accompanying snack. I did, however, find a bag of pistachio nuts in the kitchen. Game on…

The thing about pistachios is their addictive quality. Choose a nut, crack it open, eat the nut, and repeat. It can go on for hours like that, facilitating conversation or enhancing whatever I happen to be watching on TV. I tell myself, “No more,” but then I remember that nuts are protein, and protein is good for you, so the cycle begins all over again. Pretty soon, the bowl of empty shells is overflowing, so I go to the kitchen to replenish the supply, and the world of salty snacks starts to spin anew.

“Is this going somewhere?” you ask. (That’s a line from one of my all-time favorite jokes; Google “The Monkey Joke.”) Anyway, the new bowl of pistachios and its poor cousin, the bowl of empty shells, makes me think about all the things we do over and over again without much thought like the things we do when we’re just going through the motions, delaying, disregarding outcomes, scratching some itch here, satisfying some craving there. Pistachios are the anthesis of purpose: they are mindless action; the longer you go on eating them, the harder it is to stop.

As much as I’d like to think that I’m just the man William Ernest Henley had in mind when he was composing “Invictus”—you know, “the master of my fate, the captain of my soul”—pistachios remind me that there are times when I’m definitely neither master nor captain. For better or for worse, there are those moments in life when I’m more likely to avoid whatever impediment lies in my path by retreating into a bowl of pistachios than I am to boldly assume command of the frigate that is transporting my fate and soul. You see, over the years, I’ve learned there is only so much I can control, and while I think I’ve made progress with many of my smaller impulses—my “pistachios”—I know there are still some moments when I prefer those tasty little nuts to meaningful forward progress. That may not be human nature, but it is my nature. Sigh.

One of the many reasons that I love and admire my wife is that she has the capacity to rise above the pistachios in her life. Don’t get me wrong: she’s been known to consume her fair share, and to occasionally succumb to worrying about the things she cannot control. However, when it comes to facing the bigger challenges in her life, she never shrinks. The word I often use to describe her attitude (sometimes aloud, sometimes silently) is “relentless.” No mountain is ever too high, no problem is ever too complicated. She will batter away at it until either the problem is solved or the person on the other end of the line gives up. She is a purposeful woman, rarely given to pistachio pursuits.Ecclesiastes reminds us that “for everything there is a season, a time to every purpose under heaven.” I’ll take that to mean that an occasional bout with a bag of pistachios is ok as long as I don’t become addicted to some brainless routine that leaves me feeling bloated and unsatisfied. Old as I am, I’m still trying to become the master of my fate, the captain of my soul.

Damn the pistachios! Full speed ahead!

I’ll be right back.

Jamie Kirkpatrick is a writer and photographer who lives in Chestertown. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Washington College Alumni Magazine, and American Cowboy Magazine.

His new novel, “The Tales of Bismuth; Dispatches from Palestine, 1945-1948” explores the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is available on Amazon.