“Big Shopping at Fry’s Yesterday”

Tucson painting by Felix Pasilis
I haven't written in 3 weeks

and it was 3 earthshaking weeks

One of those months you never forget, there was so much emotion and intensity

And so much soul-searching

So it makes sense when I decided to return to my writing this morning, I wound up writing this simple little story about grocery shopping yesterday

LOL it is how we return to the world, when we have been out of the world

All my love, Anne

“Big Shopping at Fry’s Yesterday”
5:43 AM, Saturday, June 28, 2008

It is a soft morning. End of June, July is in a few days. Monsoon season on the desert has started, so early morning air is soft warm dampish. Already some clouds have appeared. The world of green out my window is soft and blurry. Without clarity nothing is distinct. All the leaves seem to blend into each other. This is not a world of high definition, it is the reverse, this is the soft world.

And I can see how a baby would be born in this soft world, warm and moist, where there are no edges. It is a soft new-born world. Just a soft attractive green blur where the trees are. Everything has been softened for baby’s first day. The world has been turned into a nursery.

I did a big shopping at Fry’s yesterday. It was the highlight of my day. I woke up with booboo in my foot, another ascension symptom (the body adapting to moving into faster frequency). It was so hard walking from room to room, I thought “no way will I able to do my shopping at Fry’s today. No way will I be able to do anything, go outside and open windows on truck, put the dishes in the dishwasher, and supermarket shopping at Fry’s is out.” But in fact when Bill walked Beanie, I did hobble out and open all the windows on the truck. And that gave me confidence. So I did load all the dishes into the dishwasher and even walked around the house looking for more dishes. And that gave me a lot of confidence, because it meant everything is on schedule.

I didn’t think I would be able to do grocery shopping when it was so hard to hobble to the truck to go swimming. I thought “we will just have to make do with the food we already have in house.” But I swam for whole hour at Billie's pool. And I thought “this long soak must be good for my tootsies,” and I realized I really wanted to do that shopping, it would make me feel strong to do it. I swam over to Bill just before I left the pool and said “do you want to do Fry’s after the pool?” He said “it’s up to you, is your foot up to it?” “Yes” I said. Of course getting out of the pool was not easy, I had to climb that ladder to get out and my foot just couldn’t take the weight. I was stymied! Finally I simply crawled onto the cement deck. It didn’t give me confidence that I couldn’t climb the ladder to get out of the pool, but had to crawl on the cement deck, but at least I had gotten out of the pool. I took my shower and washed my hair. I really wanted to do the supermarket shopping.

I thought, I will have that big shopping cart to lean into, it will make it easy for me, plus Bill can help me out, he can get the soda and the vegetables, and dish detergent for washing dishes. I was very motivated to do the shopping because there were some things I was all out of.

We haven’t been to Fry’s in long time. It is close to Billie’s pool but not close to Fort Lowell pool, and we have been swimming at Fort Lowell pool every day. Plus ever since Sunflower market opened, it has been so appealing to go there. It is close to home and on the way home; it is small intimate market, I know everyone; and it is so attractive and everything there is nice. It is so easy. That is why I always wind up at Sunflower. Altho I always loved Fry’s, it’s just that it is a huge supermarket so I always wind up doing huge shopping.

And it is luxurious a huge supermarket, because it does have everything. Sunflower has very nice food, but if you need dish detergent you have to go to another store, or if you want soda you have to go to another store. I was out of a lot of things that Sunflower doesn’t carry. It was so nice to be able to buy all the food I wanted plus all the other things I was out of. And anyway I just love Fry’s.

It is a big experience, an adventure.

Plus I knew if I did big shopping at Fry’s it would put it in perspective for Bill about my foot. Of course it alarmed him when he saw me hobbling, but if he saw me do huge shopping at Fry’s, he would realize it was no big deal. And so would I! It would put it in perspective for me too. It is a bit of a nuisance but it is a big nothing.

I really did have a great time shopping at Fry’s. While swimming at pool I had memorized all the things I needed. I didn’t want it to be a shopping where, when I got home, I realized half the reason I went there I forgot to buy those things. Plus now that Sunflower is my main market, I have clear ideas what Sunflower doesn’t have, what I have to go to Fry’s for, and I wanted to be sure to buy those things.

So I did huge shopping and loaded up my cart. And Bill took his own cart and got all the soda and the vegetables, frozen vegetables to make suppers out of, and fresh vegetables for salads, and dish washing detergent too, two boxes of it. And it made it so easy for me that he chose his frozen vegetables for cooking dinner, and I didn’t have to figure out what he likes.

I knew it would be huge heavy shopping to take into house, but he was so overjoyed to see that my foot was no impediment to accomplishing huge shopping, that he happily brought it all in.

When we got to check-out counter, we arrived together, the girl who was bagging my groceries asked me if I was from Queens. I lit up with delight. Who in the world would recognize my accent as a Queens accent! Most people in Tucson are thrilled out of their mind when they identify it as a New York accent. They ask me very tentatively “are you from New York by any chance?” Or if they are not that confident, they say “where are you from?” And when I say “New York” they say “I guessed it!” They are so excited and happy at their insightfulness, so delighted with themselves. I don’t know if any of them have even heard of Queens. So you can imagine how excited I was when the woman said “are you from Queens?” “YES!!!” I said. I knew she had to be from Queens too to recognize my accent.

And when she met us at the truck as Bill was stowing away the groceries, she told us all about herself. I don’t know the part of Queens where she grew up, Queens is very big, and there are so many parts I don’t know at all. But it turned out her dad was handball player, Bill had become a handball player in New York so he knew that world. On all the holidays her dad would go to Brighton Beach where the top handball players from all over the city congregated to play with each other. And her dad would go fishing there too, on party boats, just as Bill did. Her dad liked handball and fishing, just like Bill. She said her parents moved to Tucson when she was 19 years old and she came with them, they all moved out here together, so she has been here long time. And she told Bill “you look like a contractor, are you a contractor by any chance?” Because, she told Bill, her husband Raul, he is Mexican-- “I love Mexicans!” I said, which is true-- does the cement work, but he got laid off when the building boom in Tucson stopped. And she said “it is causing marital problems.” She got the job at Fry’s because they needed money, but it makes him feel bad that he can’t take care of her, and she really wants him to find work, it will get him out of the house, plus he will feel good again. And she wrote down their name and phone number.

And Bill said on the way home, “if we had money, I would hire him to cement that outside wall, where the big crack was, I did the job but I don’t like how it looks, I would have him do it all over again, plus the wall in the kitchen which is tumbling down.” “We might have money” I said, “I forgot to check my lottery ticket while I was in Fry’s, we could have money and not know about it.” And we both thought about all the work we would hire him to do, so he would get out of the house and be happy again.

And the woman said “I don’t know why I am telling you this,” and then she told us about her 99 year old aunt who is so independent and how she called her, and her aunt said “Bethie! I am so happy to talk to you,” and she told us “Bethie is my baby name.” But of course I called her Bethie after that, it is how I learned her name. But I could see she was surprised that the only person in the whole world who calls her by her baby name is her 99 year old aunt, and a girl in the Fry’s parking lot.

Post script, well the sun rose, sky is blue, birds are out and about. And my foot is all better. I guess shopping at Fry’s did the trick.