A Trip to the Supermarket

A Trip to the Supermarket

 The little old woman craned her neck to read the sign. Ed’s Emporium was a large superstore which sold anything and everything that you could think of. From milk to muskrats, couches to convertibles, you could find it all here. Taking up four city blocks, it was probably one of the largest superstores in the country and definitely the biggest of its kind in the city of Overton.  

  Mrs. Gwin stood just outside of the building. It was almost ridiculous, the contrast between the giant store and the old widow. Eunice was about five feet in height with a slightly bent upper back and curly white hair to boot. She was at this monstrosity of a store because she needed some flour for her special, homemade, Pumpernickel Sweet Bread.  It was a tradition of hers to make it every year at about Christmas time. She tried to think back to that special day so many years ago…

 

  On her thirteenth birthday, after many a slice of cake had been consumed and presents unwrapped, Eunice’s mother told her that they needed to talk privately. She led Eunice to the master bedroom, making sure no one followed, and proceeded to close and lock the door. Mrs. Gwin then told her daughter that, turning thirteen, she was old enough to be trusted with their family’s most closely-kept secret, the recipe for Great-Grandma Beatrice Gwin’s famous Pumpernickel Sweet Bread. This amazingly popular bread had won countless contests and received praise for its consistency, perfect moistness, and its undeniably good taste. There had been many attempts to copy and even steal this recipe. But Great-Grandma Beatrice, being prepared as she was, had made her thirteen year-old daughter memorize the recipe.

This is what Mrs. Gwin did with her own daughter. Each woman was to have her offspring memorize it (at the risk of being slightly obsessive) and the recipe was passed, in this way, down through the generations so that it would always be in the family, safe from harm.

  Eunice would usually have the ingredients delivered from Mr. McMillan’s store a block from her house, but it was closed for renovations, the first time in over thirty years. She didn’t know why the man suddenly decided to remodel his little store. The only people who shopped there were friends and neighbors who had shopped there for years. These people agreed that a small, family-owned business was better than a store where employees referred to each other as “that guy over there.”

   Hearing of this, one of Eunice’s friends, Muriel, had recommended that she shop at this the new superstore in town.

 “Besides, you could stand to get out of the house once in a while.” Seeing no alternative shopping opportunities, Eunice supposed, at the time, that she should at least see the inside of the store.

 

   Sighing, and wondering what she had gotten herself into, Eunice stumped towards the entrance, and the doors started to slide open. But then they stopped. There was about a three-inch gap between the two sliding glass doors.  

   Then the gap closed. The old woman stood and watched, somewhat flustered, as the doors opened again, this time leaving about a five-inch gap. Noticing the malfunctioning doors, one of the employees inside the building came to her aid. With much advising such as “Pull harder!”, “That’s it!”, and “Just a little more!” he had her pull the doors open. Slipping between the two doors, Eunice gave the employee a dirty look as he stared at the doors, talking about how “Someone really should get that fixed.” As Eunice passed him, she noticed the word Maintenance on his name tag.

   Eunice entered the lobby of the store and looked around. “My goodness!” she exclaimed. The store was huge. The ceiling seemed to be ten stories above her head. She looked towards what she assumed to be the back of the store. All she could see were the large metal shelves that housed every item imaginable. The aisles seemed to continue as far back as the eye could see.

  As she stood gaping at the cavernous warehouse inadequately labeled a store, she spotted a clerk. The gangly, teenage, sales clerk, obviously new to the job, was being lectured by his aging, ever-widening boss. The tall one, seeing an elderly woman needing assistance (and an opportunity to get a raise) rushed to her service, completely ignoring the protests of his vertically challenged supervisor.

  “Can I help you M’am?” Eunice smiled.

“Yes, could you tell me where-” but she was interrupted by the teenager who was reading a short sales pitch that he had copied down on the palm of his right hand.

“Might I interest you in our new, designer-” at this point he flipped his hand over to read the back of it- “series mega-wreath version 2.2 for this Christmas?” Eunice stopped and, with a confused look on her face, responded.

  “What was wrong with it?” The young man swallowed.

“What do you mean?”

“What was wrong with the first one that was made?” the young man glanced around nervously.

“Well there were several things wrong with the wiring of the lights, besides the fact that, to be able to offer something before our competition, we bought from some… questionable characters.” Glancing over the young man’s shoulder, Eunice saw that the older man had his head in his hand, probably wondering why employment standards had sunk so low. Realizing his boss’ impatience was increasing, the young man nervously cleared his throat and tried again. “Would you like to buy a wreath?” he tried.

“Oh, no thank you. I’m just here to buy flour-” Here he indiscreetly referred to his other hand.

“We also offer, at this fine establishment, our home-grown, pre-packaged, poinsettias in our conditioned greenhouse. That would be…”

He paused, thinking for a moment, “sector 3 in aisle 61 I believe.” The elderly woman stared at him for a minute and tried a third time, her exasperation evident.

“No, I need baking flour, not flowers.” The young man stared at her for a few seconds.

“Oh… well…” she watched as he grabbed his right leg, lifted it, and pulled up his pant leg to read something that he had scribbled along the inside of his leg, all the while, trying to keep his balance; “…are you sure you don’t need a new 72’, ultra-thin television set complete with a DVD player and Blu-ray capabilities?”

   After ten minutes of convincing the acne-covered teenager that she did not want a new garden hose or an inflatable reindeer he was dragged off by his older, now very angry associate, leaving Eunice Gwin to find the flour on her own. Seeing no particular aisle that would necessarily have flour in it, Mrs. Gwin set out for the aisle directly ahead. There were no signs to indicate what was housed in each aisle, but after seeing how the store was staffed, this didn’t surprise her.

   As she entered the first aisle, she saw that it had nothing in it but plates! Eunice was completely surrounded by plates. Plastic plates, glass plates, paper plates, square plates, round plates, there were more plates than you could count! But Mrs. Gwin didn’t need plates. So she trudged through to the end of the aisle and tried the next one on her left. As she approached it her vision was filled with books of fiction. They were everywhere; books by any author that you could think of, and many that you couldn’t. There was probably a collection there comparable to the library of congress. But Mrs. Gwin didn’t need books.

   Eunice sighed to herself. “This is going to be a long day.”

  Finding the few employees that she saw to be of no help, Eunice spent the next few hours scouting out about half of the store. Tired, bedraggled, and wondering whether it was worth it, she rounded the end of an aisle and started into the next. Suddenly her eyes lit up, she perked up, and her mouth opened in a smile. She was surrounded by flour. There was flour in all sizes. From crates to bags to boxes you could find it all here. She scanned over the shelves. There was rye flour, buckwheat flour, even flour made out of almonds! But Mrs. Gwin didn’t need any of those. All she wanted was some plain, white, baking flour. She walked down the aisle, looking for anything that looked familiar. Suddenly she saw it. There were rows of white flour made by all the major brand names that you could think of. Eunice quickly grabbed the first standard size bag that she saw and headed for the front.

   After another hour finding her way, Mrs. Gwin stood at the front of the building looking for a checkout lane. Finding one open, she made her way toward it. Placing her flour on the small conveyor belt, the small woman fished around in her purse for a five-dollar bill. Without looking up, the senior citizen decided to make small talk with the cashier.

   “So, have you worked here long?” The cashier pressed the button for the conveyer and responded.

“No not very long. Actually I was hired just a few days ago.”

“Oh, that’s nice.” Suddenly Eunice froze. Recognizing the familiar voice, she slowly turned her gaze upon the cashier’s face. It was the sales clerk whom she had met shortly upon arriving at the store. A wave of frustration rose up in Mrs. Gwin with the realization that with this guy even something as simple as checking out would be a hassle. But she decided that she should be friendly and make small talk. So, after having over two hours to wonder about it, she asked the question that had been at the back of her mind since she had first met the teenager.

“What is your name anyways young man?” The newly-dubbed cashier stared at her for a second and responded quietly, with a grimace in his voice; “Marlin.” Eunice almost winced at this (not finding taste in being named after a fish) but nodded instead.

  “I see.” Marlin scanned her item, punched a few buttons on the keyboard, and announced; “That’ll be $3.65.” Mrs. Gwin found a five-dollar bill and handed it to Marlin. He cleared his throat. “Well, seeing as that I owe $1.35 in change, would you prefer 135 pennies, 1 dollar bill and 35 pennies, 27 nickels-2 half-dollars-3 dimes and 5 pennies-” Eunice, being already impatient from wasting three hours buying flour, turned and stormed out of the store. Marlin shouted to her “Wait ma’m! What about the change?”

 “Keep it!” she called to him without looking back. As she exited the building, and headed for the bus stop, Eunice Gwin sighed to herself. When the bus arrived, she climbed on, found a seat, and rode to her small house.   

   When she arrived at her house, she unlocked the door, went inside, hung her coat up in the hall, and collapsed into her overstuffed armchair. As she sat trying to forget the events of the day, she decided that she should start making her Pumpernickel Sweet Bread. Only after she had entered the kitchen and prepared all the ingredients that she needed did she realize. She had forgotten the flour.  

copyright Jackson Kerr, 2012