The Grocery Store

Almost everyone goes to the grocery store.  Depending on where and when I go, I encounter strikingly different varieties of people.  In the middle of the afternoon on a Wednesday, at the Shaw’s in Colchester, I encounter the following. 

There are the moms.  I don’t like the moms.  I find them cliquey and rude.  And if they have a child with them I immediately find them to be excellent mothers (aww) or terrible mothers (eww). 

I was walking down an aisle approaching a mom perusing the salad dressings, her cart blocking my path.  As I approached I slowed, looked towards her and voiced a mild-mannered “excuse me” accompanied by a smile.  She didn’t look in my direction.  Nor did she move her cart.  She did not acknowledge the fact that I had stopped in the aisle, politely awaiting her next move.  Instead she grabbed an item off the shelf, manhandled her cart into the right direction, turned and walked away.  Sorry to have been a bother, your majesty.

There are the people in sweatpants.  Most of this group is drastically overweight.  The grocery store is one of the few places where it seems acceptable to wear whatever the hell you want.  I could go into the different styles of sweatpants and what each might convey about their owners, but I won’t.

I saw a man today with grey sweatpants and a tank top.  It was in the upper 30’s outside.  His arms were a tannish red on the front, pasty white on the back like he had fallen asleep in a tanning booth.  He didn’t look like the tanning salon type.  He was obese and all of his exposed skin, arms, shoulders, neck, and the top of his back, were covered in long dark hair.  I shouldn’t say covered.  If it were covered I wouldn’t see his skin.  He was walking from register to register pushing his cart, on a mission for a cold soda.  Soon he found a cooler and opening the door, knocked several items from the display.  He did not pick them up.  

There are the old people.  There are two types of old people; the singles and the couples.  The couples move more slowly through the store, as even after decades of marriage, and years of weekly visits to the same grocery store, they still seem to discuss each item.  There is one positive, they are two people with one cart. 

The single old people are perhaps more interesting.  Mostly they are women, either because they do the shopping, or just as likely because their husbands have passed.  Despite their similarly extensive experience shopping for groceries, and the added simplicity that each is one person who likely knows what he or she wants, these people are almost as slow.

What makes them the less preferred of the old people sub-groups is that they each have a cart, and they tend to gossip in groups of two or three, clogging the two-lane aisles.  The next time I hear talk of a new recipe, or what’s on special, I might just stop and ask questions.  Of course if I hear that excited tone that could only mean a juicy piece of gossip I’ll have to respect their privacy.

I saw a woman in the soda aisle.  She was about 65.  She had a 12-pack (I think; is that how they sell soda) of Coca-Cola and a 12-pack of Coke Zero in her cart and she was staring blankly at the shelves in front of her.  As I came closer she made a selection, grabbing hold of a third 12-pack, this time Coke Zero Cherry (or Cherry Coke Zero, I’m not sure).  She smiled and maneuvered her cart out of the way as I passed.

There are the blue collar guys.  I’m not sure what the deal is with them.  They come in twos and threes and buy a lot of ground beef.  Maybe they’re firemen stocking up the firehouse fridge.  They are loud and obnoxious, but they seem like good guys, they shop quickly, and they leave me alone.  I also get an occasional laugh out of their boisterous, juvenile humor.  I like them.

There are the young couples.  They’re quiet and they don’t get in my way.  I like them as well.

That is all.