Going to the Grocery Store before the snow

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It is always an adventure going to the grocery store, an adventure I take everyday just to get out of the house and to figure what I want to eat today, so today was no different. 

After having a cup of coffee, removing yesterday’s drying and placing the pile on the bed to sort later, slipping on the same pair of jeans and same pull over fleece shirt, it is time for a last look outside to test the sunshine, then check the house to make sure nothing has moved since the witnesses came by.

The greasy fry pan can wait until later since I will make the other two burgers for dinner tonight and the empty beer boxes can wait until tomorrow to wander to the trash to be with their other friends. 

Standing in the sun I stand still. Not looking at anything in particular I watch the shadows and listen to the rustle of leaves on the other side of the yard as the yard monkeys scurry around. A young one comes up to my feet, probably expecting a peanut but confused on whether to run away or wait for a shell to be thrown. After a while I appear to be just another item of the yard and he wanders of to another search.

Being a warm day full of sunshine, I extend my trip to the grocery store going different directions than usual until the amount of traffic increase and guide me to my destination.

As I lock up my bike to a stop sign I look at the constant stream of traffic. It is only eleven o’clock the day BEFORE the proposed snowfall and already the city is going nuts. The guy in the white SUV next to me looks worried that I am so close to him, so he moves. The mulch still has my tracks of parking there yesterday. 

The grocery store is being refurbished. I guess that is what they call it. New brick exterior over top of another brick exterior, windows in what will be a seating area that the old folk can drink a cup of coffee and sit there all day staring out at the parking lot. All and all it will look better but in a few months I will still just be a grocery store.

As I walk between the barricades set up to keep the traffic from running over the steady flow of people who must buy their milk and eggs I get behind a woman slowly pushing a walker when she stops and ask a woman walking the other way about why the entrance is so far away now and she will not continue to come to this store if they don’t change it back to the way it was.

I jump the barricade in front a slow moving black SUV with the driver talking on the phone. I bypass the discussion that one-day I will be having. The door is full of clutter of children and mothers and ancients all looking very confused as they wander back into the sunshine with their wire carts beaming with the rewards of their journey. 

Oops! Sorry, had to take a break to scare off a hawk.

Now where was I? Oh, yes, the grocery stores on the day before the snowfall. 

It is an interesting place all in all. A grocery store is a little city unto itself. It has it’s own manufacturing, transportation, entertainment, and massive infrastructure. A lord of the land, or manager in this case, must oversee a multitude of poorly educated and minimally trained servitude to move the most highly prized and perishable products any homo sapiens must acquire – FOOD! This crew of remarkably dull people is rewarded for their labors of moving and shifting boxes and cans and bottles back and forth while wearing colored shirts and almost as a requirement having little personal contact with the customers. Maybe this avoidance may be due to this organization probably gets more complaints than any other due to the variety of patrons and the volatile nature of it’s product. 

So I wander into the staging area and notice the minimal number of wire carts available. I may already be late in the game. Luckily the powered scooters are still in place awaiting riders in diapers. Dropping one cloth bag in the selected cart too big for my need but what is available I soldier on.

Once inside the sliding doors to the bodily consumption theme park I see confused faces, lots of confused faces. Sure the store is being re-designed, but there is much better signage and wider aisles, but even people like me who go there everyday seem confused that the pickles are three rows over and at the other end of the aisle from where they used to be. One must remember there are constant studies on how shoppers shop and where to place products for the best exposure. Some products like milk and eggs are at the far end of the store so you have to pass rows of temptation that “studies show” you will pick up and put in your cart.

So what is on today’s list to forage? As usual, I’ve used the excuse of restocking the critter crewe buffet but I know it is an excuse to buy more beer. It’s a left turn and off to the aisle with the greeting cards and animal food (don’t know what study combined this idea) and see one of my deepest peeves. There are two people chatting in the middle of the aisle. That isn’t a problem; I know people have to communicate to each other. That is one of the reasons I go to the grocery store everyday, just to hear my voice speaking to another person. The problem comes when the two wire carts full of bags and boxes fill the space to move.

Sure it is a petty little thing, but it urks me like people talking on the phone or wasted conversation.

So I turn the huge cart around and look for another route. The next aisle is just as bad so I continue wandering around the store trying to find a pathway without obstacles. 

I know what items I want to place in the cart and where they have be relocated, but I must maneuver through the maze of elderly staring down rows of cans trying to decide if there is something down there they need to venture to or the family trailing children picking up and stopping at anything that catches their attention while pushing a carriage and a cart or perhaps the workers themselves trying to restock the shelves with little awareness that there is a logjam of shoppers reading the price and volume weight and perhaps ingredients or sodium amount (though we really don’t do that) with their huge stack of boxes filling whatever space is available for others. 

Certain times require the peace from the yard and I just stand still until the traffic thins allowing me to push on. 

Going back to the former entrance I search the compartments for products I know they don’t have. I knew it yesterday when I purchased the last one fully knowing the grocery store would not provide me with another alternate, but I look anyway. 

Back and forth and around again I taste in my mind for a delight that may fancy the evening. Noodles? Oriental? Pizza? Cereal? Salad? 

Salad was what I was looking for, but no prepared salad await me, so the decision comes. Do I get the ingredients and make my own or wait another day? 

Again, back and forth weaving through the determined shoppers loading up for the two-inch snow drifts trying to make my decision. Around the bread table without any interest I run over in my mind what do I really want? My mind battles between what I know are best for me to consume for survival and what substances to consume are available for me today. 

Finally I decide on a deli package of celery, carrots, cucumbers (don’t stand to close) and broccoli with ranch dressing only because I still have left over ranch dress from the last carrot purchase. It is almost like a salad I rationalize to myself. 

Then I go to the beer aisle. I even contemplated purchasing a bottle of wine for the Sunday snow, but I figured it may still be clear enough to ride tomorrow and I’ll make that decision then.

So enough substance abuse to get me through the day and into the evening I move to the next adventure in the grocery store journey – the checkout.

The easy self-serve check out is open but I have found if the worker with the control to OK the purchase of alcohol is unavailable or distracted it tends to take even longer than the usual checker. Also, how can I hear my voice talking to a scanner? 

With only seed, peanuts, deli plate, beer I steer into the “15 or least” slot only to find the person in front of me needs a calculator. Oh what the hey, I’m in no hurry so I find the peace of the yard again while he unloads a variety of items I would never purchase, like Rolling Rock beer. I mean, “Really?” 

The cashier or checker or whatever you call this person who slides your requested purchase across a scanner and has to know the different between all the produce welcomes me as I hand her my grocery store card to avoid the request for the grocery store card. (Note: I fully know that this acknowledgment that I have been here again is necessary to keep the grocery store database updated and for a reward I get gasoline discounts, but since I don’t have a car and don’t buy gasoline what does it do for me except fill my wallet with another plastic card?) 

With a brief conversation and a black cloth bag filled, I bid adieu to the grocery store for another day. Back in the staging area two people with empty wire carts in hand converse. I catch an accent and smile but do not find interest in the communication. 

Breathing deep as I step back into the sun light retracing my steps suddenly taken aback by viewing an empty tree then soothing my panic by realizing I was looking at the wrong site for my pony. 

The parade of metal mobile machines increase and it is time to return to a quiet place. The ache in my leg is gone and my breathing is easier as is the purpose of the daily ride. 

Back on homeland, the future salad is placed in the small black refrigerator, the seed is spread out in the usual spots, the peanuts are tossed drawing droppings of grey from the leaves and the first beer of the day is opened with a mist while watching the little brown bunny reveal herself to munch on the seed in the sunshine.