The grocery store is the great equalizer where mankind comes to grips with the facts of life like toilet tissue.  ~Joseph Goldberg

Me & Nicole in Arizona 3/2002

Everyone once in a while I think of something that happened, and I can’t help but relive the tale, especially to my mom who is usually in on the story or knows the characters.

Let me set the stage.  Mom and I used to get my grandma’s groceries.  As the days turned over, adding up to a month, my grandma would collect her grocery list until there was big order.  Then, mom and I would go to the store and cross the items off of the list.  We would remove the groceries from one shelf and place them on another in my grandma’s apartment, only to repeat the same routine a month later.  It’s funny but years earlier we would do the same for my late Aunt Katherine – Memorial Day Tradition, although, she would join us in the grocery shopping experience.  I loved going with mom and Aunt Katherine.  Actually, Aunt Katherine made it an experience, being such a feisty old lady.  Aunt Katherine was the best!

It’s funny, I don’t remember mom taking gram for groceries after pap passed away, but I remember being a kid and going grocery shopping with my gram and pap.  Pap would wait in the car, since he had two prosthetic legs and walked with two canes, and me and gram would cruise the isles of the store filling up the cart.  She always yelled me every time I poked the ground meat in the packages and let’s not discuss the cheeses.  Rightfully so, but she was always kind of snippy with me.  Maybe my natural hyperactivity and the fact that I would dance around between the shelves of groceries because I Don’t Like to Push a Shopping Cart! made her more irritable than usual.  Either way it was never like shopping with mom or Aunt Katherine.

Now-a-days gram doesn’t drive, in fact she really doesn’t leave her apartment. Hence, why she needs assistance.  Our routine consisted of me unloading the groceries, while mom sat with gram to balance her checkbook and pay bills etc.  This was the part I always dreaded, not because of carrying the groceries, or cleaning out her refrigerator, not even close.  I didn’t mind that at all!  I’ll do anyone a favor and help out anyway I can, however I absolutely HATE gram’s smoking habit!  I detest cigarettes with such a passion!  It actually evokes real anger in me when I’m standing in a cloud of toxic smoke, especially when I’m trying to help her out.  Disrespect!  Maybe that’s a blog post for another day or a subject for a therapy session.

Sometimes to give mom a break, or to help her out with gram, Nicole and I would take it upon ourselves to tackle the monthly grocery list.  Same goes for me and Kyle, taking on the responsibility of the gathering the outlined items and putting the groceries away.  Sometimes, it was as simple as stopping and picking gram up a few items.  I do want to point out that gram hated it when Nicole and I would go, especially if it was just me and Kyle in place of mom.  Perhaps she just didn’t like the change or she felt mom’s grocery shopping was guided by pixy dust and it was more magical.  Maybe the spiritual guidance that lead mom through the store helping her make her purchasing decisions didn’t reside in me?  Putting all sarcasm aside, gram was never happy to hear Nicole and I or, the dynamic duel of me and Kyle were going to the grocery store.  In fact, when this happened, gram would purposely call mom during the week to drag her back to the market for something trivial.  Personally, I never cared what gram thought, it saved mom a trip and the effort of hauling the groceries up to her apartment.  Anyway, within the past couple of years or so, gram gets someone else to follow in our footsteps and retrieve her groceries.  I guess I was fired. C’est la vie.

Me & Nicole in Ireland 6/2005

Now back to the head cheese.  The question, “What is head cheese?” might be running across your mind.  Until these grocery store adventures started for gram, I’ve never heard of head cheese either.  From that moment on, whenever head cheese appeared on the grocery list, I never took a second glance.  According to Wikipedia,

Head cheese, or brawn, is a cold cut that originated in Europe. A version pickled with vinegar is known as souse. Head cheese is not a cheese but a terrine or meat jelly made with flesh from the head of a calf or pig(sometimes a sheep or cow), and often set in aspic. Which parts of the head are used can vary, but the brain, eyes, and ears are usually removed. The tongue, and sometimes even the feet and heart, may be included.

Head cheese may be flavored with onion, black pepper, allspice, bay leaf, salt, and vinegar.  It is usually eaten cold or at room temperature as a luncheon meat.  It can also be made from quality trimmings from pork and veal, adding gelatin to the stock as a binder.

Head cheese!  It’s definitely unusual to hear, especially for my sister.  This is where the story begins.  One trip to the grocery store consisted of me, Nicole and the grocery list, courtesy of gram.  Since I was familiar with the layout of the store and the items listed, I always remained in control of the outlined groceries.  We would walk through the isles and I shouted to Nicole each item we needed, while picking up the goods closest to me, all along crossing off the list.  It was a great system, we divided and conquered.  Toward the end of this adventure we needed to pick up the frozen food and the deli items.  I was at the far end of the isle looking for a specific item gram wanted and Nicole was free to continue.  Thinking ahead, I was sent Nicole to the deli so I could finish getting all the frozen food items.  I yelled up at Nicole and said, “Go to the deli and get a pound of sliced head cheese.”  Nicole started to take a step in the right direction and abruptly stopped, turned back to me, and gave me this look of ‘What did you say?’ before actually saying it.  Not thinking how strange it sounded, I repeated myself, followed by Nicole repeating me for clarification, “Did you say head cheese?”.  Still not really picking up on the oddity of the request, I said, “Ya sliced.”  Nicole, still in disbelieve over this conversation, said, “What is head cheese?” Now she had my attention, and I started to laugh at her dumbfounded look.  Also please keep in mind we were at opposite ends of the grocery store yelling back and forth.

Since I was always in a hurry to get gram’s groceries and put them away, I shooed Nicole off for her next mission, while I hurried up and completed the list.  As I moved to the adjacent isle, which also housed the deli where Nicole was standing in line, I finished retrieving all the items before meeting up with the ‘head cheese’ wrangler.  At that moment she got the goods and looked at me with bewilderment and said, “It doesn’t really look like cheese!”  I started laughing because this was so funny and especially because what was ready to come out of my mouth.  I clarified her comment by saying, “Well it’s not cheese, it’s meat parts.” Nicole’s face was priceless!  She said, “What? Meat parts?”  At this point, I was ready to start rolling around on the floor from laughter.  To help her in her understanding of what she was holding I said, “It’s like parts of animals all ground up and made into a lunch meat.”  Nicole with a grossed out look said, “That’s disgusting!”  Certainly I agree with her, but it was on the list.

Now why am I talking about head cheese?  Only because it came up the other day and Kyle thinks it’s the funniest story he’s ever heard.  For some reason he loves hearing me and mom laugh about that situation, which was really funny!  Kyle still brings up the tale of the head cheese and says, “Hey Aunt Heather, remember when Aunt Nikki got the head cheese for gram Alice?”  He giggles and laughs like he was there, although Kyle is always with us in spirit and on our minds.

It’s funny, Kyle loves to be a part of the family stores and I love sharing them with him, even if it’s just about head cheese.

*When talking to Kelly about head cheese, I asked her if she knew what it was and Kelly said, “Isn’t that dandruff?”  That was so funny and extremely gross.  Good one Kelly!

It was last Friday and I happened to be in the store when an elderly woman, accompanied by what appeared to be her daughter, was haltingly pushing a shopping cart.  She was kind of leaning on the cart, using it to help her keep her balance I guess.  ~Lida Krieger

Cousin Katie playing with Kyle

Those that know me, know I HATE to push shopping carts.  Not only shopping carts but strollers and such.  When Kyle was just a baby, I carried him around in this papoose contraption.  It was the coolest thing!  Kyle would hang off of my stomach facing me when he was really little until graduating to facing out, then as he got a little bit bigger, I wore him like a backpack.  My hands were free to shop, get groceries etc.  I never wondered off away from him, not even an inch, and I felt like he was safer being strapped to me.  Basically my point is, I didn’t even push a stroller or buggy.  Then, once Kyle was old enough I had him walk everywhere.  Great exercise and it wore him down, allowing for perfect naps and a great night sleep, for everyone.  Kyle has always, and still always goes with me everywhere.  I guess I got my money’s worth out of that papoose.

This brings me the shopping cart discussion.  Why you may ask am I bringing this up?  Well, my dear friend Kelly said she found my match the other day.  Evidently, this guy was at the grocery store walking back and forth to fill up his cart. That was too funny!  Kelly said she instantly thought of me, and it’s true!  I do that!  Here’s the way it goes.  I get my cart at the entrance of the grocery store.  Then I take it to the middle of the produce section and I walk back and forth to fill it up.  Then, when I’m done in that area, I push the cart to main isle of the grocery story and proceed to maneuver up and down the different shelves gathering items.  This all happens while my shopping cart remains fixed in one location.  Once my hands are full, I swing by the cart to unload the goods.  This continues until everything on my list is crossed off and then I push the load of groceries to the checkout.  Also a little known fact, if I can manage to carry all the bags in my hands, then I ditch the cart.  If there is a substantial amount of groceries, then I will concede and push the buggy to the car for unloading.  That pretty much wraps up my shopping procedures.

If I don’t need a buggy, I love to carry those little plastic baskets on my arm.  I feel like little red ridding hood.  I carry the arm baskets everywhere in the store.  Well, that is unless I get too many items, which is usually the case and I have to leave it on the floor somewhere until I’m ready to check out.  At that point, I continue with the standard walking back and forth filling up the arm basket that is now residing on the floor somewhere, until I’m ready to heave it to the checkout.

Pushing a buggy makes me feel like I’m weighed down and I can’t move freely.  Maneuvering through people is difficult, especially if it’s crowed.  That drives me crazy!  I don’t have the patience to wait till shoppers step aside from their slow moving motions and get out of my way.  Believe it or not, if there are a lot of people in the isle, I will go to another one to continue shopping before returning to that specific isle to get what I need. If I am forced to adventure down a crowed area, I’ll do it, but being trapped in an isle with a grocery cart and several other shoppers and their carts makes me completely claustrophobic!

Since I will walk back and forth a zillion times and not push the cart, it probably takes me longer in the grocery store, but I truly don’t care.  Now I’ve never conducted time tests on which is more efficient, pushing the buggy through crowds of people or parking the cart and going back and forth.  I bet with the speed that I walk at, it’s a wash.  Sounds like I take extra steps?  Yep, I do, but who cares, it’s great exercise and I don’t feel confined to a buggy.  I’m also the believer that every extra step does a body good.

This also sounds like I don’t have a system when retrieving groceries.  However, I do, but I have no issue changing it up on the fly to make my shopping experience more enjoyable.  Not to mention, gaining a little extra movement in my adventures in grocery shopping is actually a goal of mine.

Naturally, I have a different shopping adventure when others are joined with me, like mom or Kyle.  Shopping with mom is slow moving, ever since her knees have gotten bad.  In fact, now-a-days she takes the motorized carts, which totally crack me up!  But when she has the regular old shopping cart, she tends to be a leaner.  She pushes the cart and leans on it the entire time like she is using a walker.  This works out, since I don’t like to push the cart.  Mom used to go through the grocery store and stop to retrieve the items around her, while she instructed me on the items to grab. I would run around and come back with the packaged food items in my hands.  Now that’s a perfect team!

When I was in high school and mom was more in her prime, I would dance around the grocery store while mom pushed the buggy. Yep, I did!  I would jazz run up and down the isles, leaping and making up routines in the middle of the store.  Now I really didn’t do this when other patrons where in close proximity to us, but when the shelves only saw us in view, look out.  I couldn’t stop my feet from moving.  Usually mom would ignore me, and sometimes I got on her nerves, especially when I would get out of control and practically run people over.  Generally speaking, I would dance around mom as she filled up the cart.

Then you have Kyle on the other hand.  He’ll push the cart for me, only because he knows I don’t like to, but he just can’t leave it in place while I run around and fill it up.  He has to keep it within a foot from us and that makes me want to loose my mind.  Sometimes I feel like I can’t escape the shopping cart, like its the possessed car from Christine!  That’s even worse, than if I was pushing the cart the entire way through the store.  At least I would have the opportunity to free myself from the ball and chain.  With Kyle, he has to have it right beside us!  I do realize there is no doubt, I drive him crazy with the way I shop.  Sometimes, I’ll compromise and park the buggy at the end of the isle, as opposed to the middle of the store, and walk up and down the shelves of groceries before returning.  He will start walking up the isle with me, and then turn around and grab the cart and push it towards us.  Every time!  I have been known to loose my temper and say, “Kyle!  Just leave it, we’ll be right back.” followed by Kyle’s justification of “No that’s ok, I’ll just push it.”  Then I declare, “No one wants to take our groceries, it’s not like we paid for them yet.”  He just can’t handle it and ignores me to continue on his course of action.

On that note, I’ve actually had people take my buggy thinking it was theirs.  Also, visa verse, I’ve accidentally walked off with someone’s cart.  Usually, I’m pretty quick to notice and return it without incidence.  But I can’t say that’s always happened to me.  There were times when I never got my selected items back in my possession.  What did I do?  What else?  I started all over.  I might have been a little irritated, but I understand the consequences behind my actions and I’m willing to take the chance.

Gigi sport’in a smile & wave.  I think Kyle took this picture years ago.

I will admit the dumb part of this entire process is when I leave my money in the wide openness of an abandoned shopping cart.  I’ve heard of theft happening from this action, even though I’ve been blessed enough to not have experienced it.  Usually, if I don’t have my purse with me, I will keep my wallet tucked under my arm, and the cell phone in my pocket.  But if I have cash and Kyle’s with me, I hand it to him and he usually tucks it away in his cargo pockets.  Skeptical?  I’m not at all!  Kyle is extremely responsible and I trust him explicitly.  He’s always been my little side kick.  Plus, I use that as a way to teach him responsibility.  I know the consequences if this decision would go a rye.  But you know what?  To teach Kyle responsibility and show him how much I trust him, I’m willing to take that chance, even if it costs me a couple hundred dollars.

Usually, if mom needs groceries she hands me a list that I follow.  This allows me and Kyle to divide and conquer.  I park the shopping cart in one location and give him the task of retrieving a few items.   Yep, I’m making him walk back and forth, but it does speed things up.  This is also a learning lesson, giving Kyle the opportunity to find the items and learn where they are located on his own.  He also has no trouble asking workers for assistance.  Good experience!

OK, I do want to call out that this habit doesn’t just happen in grocery stores.  Quick story.  When I was in high school, I went to the discounted clothing store, Gabrielle’s to do a little bit of shopping.  It was winter and naturally I wore my heavy coat.  Me being me, I slipped out of my coat and placed it in the buggy before beginning to shop. Eventually, I worked my way, away from the cart, probably for a considerable amount of time, looking through racks of miscellaneous cloths.  At one point, I realized, I haven’t seen my buggy in a while.  Please note, my car keys and money where in my coat, in the cart.  Yikes!  I started running around the store looking for the missing assistant on wheels, but no luck!  Just then, something caught my eye.  It was MY coat, placed among a rack with other winter coats!  What?  I double checked the pockets, and sure enough my gloves where in there with my car keys and money.  Now, the rest of my selected items have since been returned to their previous residence, but at that moment I didn’t care at all.  My brother was there with me, and after I told him about dodging a bad situation, he just rolled his eyes at me.  To this day, that cracks me up.  I almost had both of us stranded and he just rolled his eyes at me and said he was driving us home.  No problem, I never really liked to drive anyway. Especially, since Ryan was always a better driver.

I guess everyone has their own corks and hiccups, mine is the aversion to pushing shopping carts, buggies, strollers etc.  Am I alone on this one?

In chess one cannot control everything. Sometimes a game takes an unexpected turn, in which beauty begins to emerge. Both players are always instrumental in this.  ~Vladimir Kramnik

Kyle was suppose to be putting away groceries... instead he chose to stack them like a poltergeist. 2012

It’s pretty evident that Kyle brightens my day, as he does with my family.  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Kyle is so much fun to be around!  I mean that sincerely.  Now I’m not saying it’s always peaches and roses, but when we are out and about, there’s usually a story that erupts of our excursions.

A couple of weeks ago was Ash Wednesday, and I picked Kyle up early in the morning for church before school started.  That way he didn’t miss swimming in the evening and he didn’t miss a bit of school.  First I’d like to say that starting your morning off in church, really starts the day off right, especially when Kyle is by my side.  Hitting the local Panera afterwards, Kyle got a breakfast sandwich to fuel him up for the day.  We won’t even discuss the ham that was on the sandwich, which I forgot no meat on Ash Wednesday, but that’s another subject all together. Then we proceeded to straight to school.  I must say I really enjoyed spending the morning with Kyle and seeing him off.  He seemed fine hanging out with me and the whole arrangement, well, that is until I decided to unfasten my seat belt to get out of the car.  In a devastated tone, Kyle said, “What are you doing?”  I said, “You’re not getting away without at least giving me a hug.  No one is around so I’d make it a quick one before the buses arrive.”  Kyle grunted and barely got near me.  Then just to torture him some more, as he walked away, I yelled, “Hey you didn’t give me a kiss!”  Kyle turned around with this shocked look, put his head down and kind of gritted between his teeth saying, “Aunt Heather do I have to?”  On my defense I looked around to see that no one was looking and then I said, “YES!” I don’t think his lips hit my cheek, but I was still happy with the half gesture.

For no reason, Kyle painted his face like a cat with maker... he had to serve mass that night 2/2012

Now fast forward about eight hours while I was at work.  Kyle and I decided to stop at the grocery store to pick up eggs to make egg wraps (multi-grain) for dinner.  Basically its a fried egg or two on a wrap with cheese, sometimes ketchup, sometimes fried potatoes, and sometimes veggies.  As we entered the store, the first thing you pass is the bread and pastry section.   Kyle all of a sudden groans, “O no why do I have to walk through this torture.  Smell Aunt Heather!”  You know he was right, it did smell heavenly.  Once we managed to get into the produce section I decided I wanted lettuce to make a salad.  I love salads!! I actually crave them.  Just then Kyle spotted the pepperoni sticks.  He grabs this long stick of pepperoni and said, “Aunt Heather I think I’m going to snack on pepperoni before we get to swimming.”  I said, “Why do you need so much?” Without missing a beat Kyle remarked, “It’s cheaper to get the big one.”  Of course! What was I thinking. It’s cheaper to get this huge stick of pepperoni that will literally last me for three years.  While we were discussing the pepperoni stick, I completely forgot to pick up potatoes.  By that time we had already maneuvered to the eggs, on the other side of the store.  We trekked back to produce section, but I didn’t realize we were headed straight for the bread and pastry area again.  We should have taken the back way, I knew I got off lucky with no arguments from Kyle the first time through.  Now, I wasn’t so sure second time around.  Not to mention I was really hungry too and I didn’t want to fall prey to the sweet temptations.  As we approached the naughty delights, Kyle took in this huge whiff and exhaled saying, “O no not again!” as he held onto the giant stick of pepperoni.  At this point I felt his pain, but he was seriously cracking me up.

On our second trip through the grocery store, we managed to get what we needed and avoid the high sugar, high carb, and no nutritional value section.  Then, Kyle realized something very important in his plan.  He said, “Hey wait, how am I going to open this to eat it?” referring to the pepperoni stick.  I busted out laughing saying, “What are you going to do, gnaw on the stick while I drive?”  He started to laugh so hard.  I mean we both pictured how utterly ridiculous he would look.  Just then, I realized they had a smaller amount of pepperoni already cut up in containers.  I instructed him to get that as opposed to the weapon we were walking around with. He argued, I could tell he really thought it was hilarious to chew on the stick, but in the end I prevailed.

As we made our way to the check out, I started scanning in the items through the self-check out. Kyle graciously said he was going to bag the items. Then he started going on in his instructional, planning dissertation about how he was going to bag the groceries, which items were going to go into which bag etc.  He was going on about what he WAS going to do. He didn’t even get started as I was too focused on looking up the lettuce code.  He kept asking me questions but I just said, “Ya ok buddy, whatever.”  because I needed to focus on paying etc. Just then I looked up at him, started to laugh and I admittedly said, “I didn’t hear a word you were saying.”  We both busted out laughing, and just at that moment I saw a clerk standing there trying to hide her giggles, no doubt directed towards us.  We must look like Laurel and Hardy.  But you what, even a simple trip to the grocery is an adventure for us.  We really do enjoy each others company!  He’s my sidekick and my little man!