Kroger’s checkout aisle. The woman in front of me has tried 3 different credit cards so far with no success.
Just down the aisle, a baby kept crying until her mother placed an iPad in front of her. Babies will lazily descend into the virtual world, where they will likely spend most of their lives.
I’m inspecting the quality of everything in my cart and reviewing the bottles of kombucha I get to see if there’s anything I can negotiate a discount on. Is it really necessary?
The woman packing my grocery bags, who looks like she’s old enough to feel comfortable retiring, instead tries to lift my 12-pack of toilet paper into the cart until I stop and say, “Okay.” That’s what I mean.
Maybe I was too much in my own head and didn’t quite appreciate that moment of heartfelt connection at the grocery store door. It was just a momentary blur of humanity in an increasingly disconnected world.
When I told him the total amount, he looked sympathetic and said, “It adds up quickly.”
I smiled weakly at her.
“Yes, that’s true.”
Neither of us said, “Thank you, Biden,” but somehow we both knew we meant it, and our smiles widened just a little.
There’s a man on speakerphone with someone in the parking lot. very I’m angry. He screams profanities into the phone and he lets out the N-word as if he’s J. Cole. I know he’s standing right next to me as I load groceries into the back of my Kia Soul. We made eye contact as he yelled into his iPhone about being disrespected.
It’s one of the most beautiful Texas afternoons I’ve seen in a long time. There is not a single cloud in the sky, and I mean literally not a single cloud. As the sun melts away the winter, the air maintains a crispness of cold temperatures.
Someone cut me off on my way out of the parking lot, but I realize I can’t blame Biden for that.
I thought a common human test was whether or not to return a shopping cart to its designated parking spot. Now that hurdle has been significantly lowered. The new test is whether you can handle grocery shopping without swearing at someone.
But it’s not that I’m angry. I still think about the old man I passed in the entrance to Kroger wearing a hat who probably said he was a Korean War veteran. I stopped a young man whose job was to pick up carts scattered carelessly in the parking lot and return them to the store. The old man shook the young man’s hand and said something like, “You’re doing a great job.”
I thought maybe he knew the young man. I have a neighbor who works at Kroger. Perhaps these people were also neighbors. It’s not a big town.
Or maybe he didn’t know him. Perhaps I misunderstood the whole scene because I was in my usual distracted rush to buy groceries without despairing over the price of garlic. Maybe I was too much in my own head and didn’t quite appreciate that moment of heartfelt connection at the grocery store door. It was just a momentary blur of humanity in an increasingly disconnected world.
This is what I thought as I watched the woman fumble for a card that wouldn’t be declined. Maybe I should offer to pay. Her card passed before I could take action, but I could only trace the impulse back to that old man at the front door.
He was kind to the people at the grocery store. Maybe I am too.
As I drove home along the uncrowded thoroughfares, I realized that humanity was just as contagious as inhumanity, but significantly less attractive. I couldn’t help but remember the details of the man yelling into the phone, but the random act of sincerity by the old man barely registered with me.
Today’s headlines are filled with the end of the world.
“He killed her.” “They hate them.”
It’s rare to read about an old man shaking hands with a young man at the local grocery store on a Sunday afternoon. Or the neighbors whose friendship escalated from an occasional “hello” to eventually planning a game night. AA graduates who were baptized in the church, or parents who settled without divorce. Countless stories of people who had plenty of excuses to despair or lash out, but didn’t.
We don’t read those stories, but we live them.
I park the car in the driveway, waiting for my husband to help me unload it. We take a short walk around the neighborhood and notice people painting doors and having barbecues.
As the sun sets in the endless sky that Texans are so proud of, we get calls from relatives asking how we’re doing.
It’s going very well.
