Supermarket
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There happen to be whole
Large parts of adult American life
That nobody talks
About in commencement speeches
One such part involves boredom routine
And petty frustration
The parents and older folks here
Will know all
Too well what Iโm talking about
By way of example
Letโs say itโs an average adult day
And you get up in the morning
Go to your challenging, white-collar
College-graduate job
And you work hard for eight or ten hours
And at the end of the day youโre tired
And somewhat stressed
And all you want is to go home and have
A good supper and maybe unwind for an hour
And then hit the sack early
Because, of course
You have to get up the next
Day and do it all again
But then you remember thereโs no food at home
You havenโt had time to shop this week
Because of your challenging job
And so now after work you have to get
In your car and drive to the supermarket
Itโs the end of the workday
And the traffic is apt to be very bad
So getting to the store takes
Way longer than it should
And when you finally get there
The supermarket is very crowded
Because of course, itโs the time of day when
All the other people with
Jobs also try to squeeze
In some grocery shopping
And the store is hideously fluorescently lit
And infused with soul-killing muzak
Or corporate pop
And itโs pretty much the last
Place you want to be
But you canโt just get in and quickly out
You have to wander all over the huge
Over-lit storeโs confusing aisles to find
The stuff you want
And you have to maneuver your junky
Cart through all these other tired
Hurried people with carts
And eventually
You get all your supper supplies
Except now it turns out there
Arenโt enough check-out lanes open
Even though itโs the end-of-the day rush
So the checkout line is incredibly long
Which is stupid and infuriating
Stupid and infuriating
Which is stupid and infuriating
Stupid and infuriating
But you canโt take your frustration out on
The frantic lady working the register
Who is overworked at a job whose
Daily tedium and meaninglessness surpasses
The imagination of any of us
Here at a prestigious college
But anyway
You finally get to the checkout lineโs front
And you pay for your food
And you get told to โHave a nice dayโ
In a voice that is the
Absolute voice of death
Then you have to take your creepy, flimsy
Plastic bags of groceries in your
Cart with the one
Crazy wheel that pulls maddeningly
To the left
All the way out through the crowded, bumpy
Littery parking lot
And then you have to drive all the way
Home through slow, heavy
SUV-intensive, rush-hour traffic
Et cetera et cetera
Everyone here has done this, of course
But it hasnโt yet been part of
You graduatesโ actual life routine
Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
D-D-Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
D-D-Day after week, after month, after year
D-D-Day after week, after month, after year
But it will be
And many more dreary, annoying
Seemingly meaningless routines besides
But that is not the point
The point is that petty
Frustrating crap like this is exactly
Where the work of choosing is gonna come in
Because the traffic jams and
Crowded aisles and long
Checkout lines give me time to think
And if I donโt make a
Conscious decision about how
To think and what to pay attention to
Iโm gonna be pissed and miserable every
Time I have to shop
Because my natural default setting
Is the certainty that
Situations like this are really all about
Me About MY hungriness and MY fatigue and
MY desire to just get home
And itโs going to seem for all the world
Like everybody else is just in my way
And who are all these people in my way?
And look at how repulsive most of them are
And how stupid and cow-like and dead-eyed
And nonhuman they seem in the checkout line
Or at how annoying and rude it
Is that people are talking
Loudly on cell phones in the
Middle of the line
And look at how deeply and
Personally unfair this is
Or, of course
If Iโm in a more socially conscious liberal
Arts form of my default setting
I can spend time in
The end-of-the day traffic
Being disgusted about all the huge stupid
Lane-blocking SUVโs and Hummers
And V-12 pickup trucks
Burning their wasteful, selfish
40-gallon tanks of gas
And I can dwell on the fact
That the patriotic or
Religious bumper-stickers
Always seem to be on the biggest
Most disgustingly selfish vehicles
Driven by the ugliest -
This is an example of how NOT to think
Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
D-D-Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
D-D-Day after week, after month, after year
D-D-Day after week, after month, after year