When the refrigerator shelf shattered, I didn’t see it as a metaphor, merely an inconvenience.
Daughter #2 had been on a summer fruit smoothie kick. She put a blender jar of leftover smoothie on the top shelf of the refrigerator. A few moments later we heard a crash. The top shelf was intact, but three levels down, the glass shelf that sits atop the vegetable crisper had shattered into a zillion pieces. I looked into the crisper and saw shards of glass adhered to leaves of cilantro. In the door of the refrigerator, glass was stuck to condiment jars.
I closed the refrigerator door and walked away.
Slice of Midlife 