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Photograph courtesy of Cookie Curci-Wright
Paper or Plastic?: Crisham's on Coe Avenue (circa 1949) was one of old Willow Glen's many small markets.
Remember When
A trip to today's supermarket can cause a super headache
By Cookie Curci-Wright
Remember the days when grocery shopping was a simple trip to the corner market and everything we needed could be found on two or three store aisles?
I miss those old-fashioned stores, the kind where a bell hung over the doorway announcing each arriving customer. The shelves were stocked with everything we needed to run a household, from sliced mutton and freshly ground coffee to perfumed soap and fading romance novels.
Shoppers got more than just groceries at these stores, they got to hear the butcher's version of a funny story going around that week. Customers were treated with the utmost care and respect. When a new customer in the community left the store, they left with the feeling they'd just made a new friend. Shopping was pleasant and leisurely.
Today, things have changed. Taking myself to the supermarket for my weekly shopping expedition also means taking with me a good supply of patience, dexterity, stamina and skill. What once was an enjoyable arena has now evolved into a combat zone of sorts where shoppers must adopt a "bump or be bumped" attitude in order to survive.
As supersized markets get even more super with endless aisles of merchandise stacked higher and higher, it's becoming a challenge to make it through a shopping day without colliding with other carts as they blindly zoom down store aisles. Poked ribs, bumped heels, bruised toes and pinched fingers are standard battle scars generated by an uncooperative grocery cart. Getting out of the store without a cart driven into the back of my heels would be refreshing.
Six-year-olds on up are allowed to operate these huge baskets on wheels; it's no wonder some drivers haven't developed the skills to negotiate these carts down an aisle without bumping a few fellow shoppers along the way. Perhaps what we need at these supermarkets are posted arterial stops at all frozen food intersections and blind corners.
Of course, the blame for this reckless driving can't be placed solely on the shopper. Nine times out of 10, it's an uncooperative shopping cart. For me, the trouble begins out in the parking lot, when I try to disengage one of these rolling baskets from a long line of carts seemingly welded together. This in itself is a challenge to my nervous system. I kick, I pull, I rattle, I jiggle, I beseech, I mumble incoherent profanities. Finally, in frustration, I give up and repeat the whole relentless process on another line of carts.
You bet your proverbial "Bippy" that the cart I've drawn will have a mind of its own. The wheel on the left will automatically want to turn right, or the wheel on the right will lock into the left-turn position. Either way, I, my basket, and three of its wheels, head for the store, while the fourth wheel heads back to the parking lot!
Maybe, as our modern supermarkets grow more sophisticated and shopping carts get more and more difficult to operate, we'll see the day when stores will employ their own "on duty" service mechanic. Sort of an in-store "Jiffy Lube" for shopping carts.
Carts will probably come fully equipped for safety with rear view mirrors, brakes, turn signals and bumper-guards. And anyone operating one will have to possess a valid automobile drivers license; store traffic cops will give out tickets to drivers who run arterial signs or make illegal U-turns in the middle of an aisle. After three tickets, the offending shopper would have to use a hand basket. And, oh yes, these new age carts will have horns we can lean on while waiting in those long check-out lines.
Recently, after I'd been waiting in a check-out line for what seemed like an eternity, an additional checker was finally called in and I breathed a sigh of relief. But to my dismay the young checker took the customer behind me who had just two seconds ago got in line. Perhaps if this checker was trained to look into the faces of his customers, he'd have known instinctively by the beads of perspiration that were gathering on my upper lip and forehead, my ashen pallor and my dazed expression, that I'd been standing in that line far too long.
Another shopping day pet peeve: Having been tall all of my life has had its perks and its problems. In recent years, with store shelves getting higher and higher, at least once per shopping day I'm asked to retrieve canned goods from the store's highest shelf. Now don't get me wrong. I'm more than happy to help a little old lady who barely stands higher than a third shelf. It's just that a lot of these shoppers just don't want to put forth the extra effort. Most of them approach me with the same tired line: "You're tall," they'll say, as if I wasn't aware of the fact. "You're a lot closer to that top shelf than I am. Reach up there and get me a can of beans."
With a silent growl, I oblige. But sometimes I wonder just how these same shoppers would react if I walked up to one of them and said, "Excuse me, you're short, and a lot closer to that bottom shelf than I am. Would you stoop down and haul me a can of green peas?"
Housewives like me don't need a workout at the gym to keep in shape, not when we have "shopping days" to build up our biceps. I lift, carry, lug and stretch all in the process of filling my shopping cart. Then I unload my groceries onto a conveyer belt, where another shopper's items invariably cascade onto my tab. After I bag and pay for my groceries, I haul them out to the trunk of my car, where again I unload them from my cart and finally drive them all home.
Once I'm home, I open the trunk and hang at least five of the plastic grocery filled bags on each arm, grab a 10-pound sack of kitty litter, and with a free hand I tuck a TV Guide between my teeth and--here's the tricky part--manage to find my house keys and open the front door. (Don't attempt this without years of practice.) Once I'm in my kitchen, I empty out all the bags, restock cupboards and shelves, freezer and refrigerator. I then collapse, exhausted, into a chair.
About this time my husband comes home from work and asks how my day has gone. I answer, "I did the grocery shopping. "To which he replies, "That's nice, dear."
Wanna bet?
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Willow Glen, California Since 1992
