Food for Thought

Ever since I was a little kid I've enjoyed grocery shopping. Granted, after I became a teenager the experience no longer held the fascination it once did, my parents being so dorky and all.

As a small child a trip to the grocery with my mother -this was back when it was still considered "woman's work" -was an event not be be missed in my world. My father was assigned to the specialty stores, deli, butcher, baker, candlestick maker. Only kidding about the last one. My mother did the bulk shopping. Not the Sam's Club, Costco, BJ's buy shit by the pallet full bulk, just the fill the shopping cart...or two bulk. I was captivated by my mother's choices of brand names.

Pride of the Farm Ketchup, when all my friends used Hunt's or Heinz.Miracle Whip faux mayonnaise, when all my friends used Hellman's. Mueller's spaghetti, when all my friend's used Ronzoni. Yukon Club (A&P house brand)soda instead of Coke. I had to go to my grandparents house to get Coca-Cola. Maybe this is the first manifestation of my parent's dorkiness that would one day keep me from ever escorting my mother to the super market again.

Just the term Super Market made going there special. Why maybe, something ultra-spectacular and stupendously wondiferous could be purchased there? I had to be there if my mother was going to buy it after saving for years.

My mother and both grandmothers were coupon clippers. I became a coupon clipper. My maternal grandmother made sure she hit whichever store had the best "deal" on whatever it was she needed.

My grandmother made my grandfather stop (if you recall from an earlier blog, Nana didn't drive) at A&P, Foodtown, Finest, Acme, and Grand Union. Not all of these establishments were located in the same town. My grandfather was a fucking saint; I swear.

My mother on the other hand was an A&P woman. Whatever needed to be had could be had at A&P. If A&P didn't have it, it wasn't worth having, or she'd ask for whatever it was to be ordered.

If I behaved, and contrary to what you might suspect I was very well behaved, I could work my mother for the junk food I adored. Twinkies, Snowballs, Ring Dings, and maybe a Clark bar at checkout.

Checkout was almost as time consuming as the shopping itself. My mother shopped for two weeks. There was no need to stop any day in between since she bought a back-up of everything. Milk was delivered by the Alderney Dairy, and Charles Chips came by once a week as well. The Dugen bread guy rounded out the staples of basic sustenance.

When we moved to Chester, A&P was the only game in town until a Shop-Rite opened several years later on the spot where I wiled away lazy summer afternoons at Grogan's swimming "thing." It wasn't a pool, nor was it a pond, it was something we swam in.

My mother switched loyalties to Shop-Rite based on square footage and selection. My grandmother continued to do her store to store routine well into her seventies. Except now she only bought six or seven items at each store. Which brings me to what inspired this drivel.

I have always done my "big" shopping on Sundays. When it was just Cory and I, I shopped on Sundays. Unless Cory was visiting his mother then there was no need to shop since most of my meals were liquid. When I remarried I continued the ritual of Sunday shopping. That way everything needed for school and work lunches would still be realatively fresh on Friday. But since school for me has recommenced, food shopping has taken a drastic turn.

My wife loathes going to the food store. That has always been my job since I so enjoyed it. She now has the responsibility occasionally. She avoids it as if all the food sold at Publix (not Winn-Dixie) was laced with arsenic so why bother going at all. However, we need to eat according to Maslow.

What winds up happening is she or I will stop if we have the time, if we happen to be driving by, if we happen to be dying of starvation, to "pick up a couple of things." I literally can't remember the last time I spent over one hundred dollars at the food store. This used to be a regular occurrence, but no more.

Last night I stopped by the grocery to "pick up a couple of items" and amidst the cooking oil and ethic foods, I had an epiphany. And it wasn't a good one. I gazed into my cart trying desperately to remember what we were out of completely at the homestead. I noticed there were only eleven or twelve items in the cart. I wanted to buy something else, anything else, just to make the cart look...I don't know...fuller. I couldn't think of a thing. Oh, there were a hundred items we needed as well as stock up on, but tonight wasn't the night for that. That was for Sunday. But I'm sure several more Sundays will come and go before those items find the cart.

So there I was, Bertolli to the left of me and LaChoy to the right, and I thought "OH MY GOD I"M SHOPPING LIKE AN OLD PERSON!!!!"

You know who I'm talking about. Those people who go to the food store every day to pick up only what they need for that day only to return the following day to repeat the process. Maybe they do it out of loneliness, or lack of something to do which is hard to believe because it seems every old person's calendar is full with doctor's appointments and they all go to my doctor. They use coupons just like I do except I never have them with me when I make an unscheduled stop to "pick up a couple of things."

I was devastated at this revelation. I swore to myself to only stop at the grocery if I'm picking up four items, or forty, but never stop for any amount in between. I'd rather go without. I'm never going to shop meal to meal. I can see it now, "Gotta stop tonight to get milk for my coffee in the morning. Don't forget to pick up a head of lettuce tomorrow afternoon for dinner that night. Christ, I think I'd rather cut my own throat with a rusty potato peeler. Maybe we need a new one. I'll pick one up the next time I stop at the store for "a couple of things."