CityView Magazine

S ons in Aisl ss e e L ne Ni Life on second thought By mary zahran ome people find their spiritual inspira- sion on his face. tion in a house of worship. Others find meanLike everyone else in the store, I had a million things to do ing and solace in nature. For me, there���s nothing like a trip to the grocery store to discover some of life���s greatest lessons. In the thirty-odd years that I have been a regular grocery shopper, I have had countless intimate conversations with other shoppers, some of them friends and some only acquaintances. I have seen women cry as they talked about their children���s struggles with drugs or an unplanned pregnancy. I have learned about divorces and heart attacks while buying milk. I have heard friends whisper with embarrassment that before Thanksgiving and not nearly enough time to get them done, but I stopped and asked him if he needed any help. He turned and looked at me with one of the saddest expressions I have ever seen. ���My wife just died, and I have to cook my own Thanksgiving meal. I don���t know what to do.��� I asked him if he could go to someone else���s house for Thanksgiving, but he told me that all of his children lived too far away for him to visit and that most of his friends were either dead or in nursing homes. For shoppers who think that a grocery store is just a place to buy groceries, I would advise them to keep their eyes, ears and hearts open. their children just flunked out of college. There is something about two people simultaneously performing a mundane task such as selecting tomatoes that invites confession. Of all these encounters, two in particular stand out, and they both occurred in exactly the same spot ��� the baking aisle. The first incident took place the week before Thanksgiving, that time when grocery stores everywhere turn into madhouses as everyone suddenly develops an interest in cooking. I was walking down the baking aisle, list in hand, hurriedly placing items in my cart, when I saw an elderly gentleman looking at aluminum baking pans with a bewildered expres12 | December ��� 2012 By this time, I was blinking back tears as I rattled off the names of some local restaurants that would be open that day. He thanked me, and I went on my way, suddenly grateful that I had a houseful of people to cook for. What had felt like an onerous task just moments before now felt like a blessing. The second incident occurred just before Easter, also in the baking aisle (what is it about that aisle?). Again, I was preoccupied with plans for our holiday dinner when I was approached by an elderly woman holding two tins of baking powder. ���Which kind do you use? I haven���t baked anything in a long time, and I can���t remember which one I used to buy.���

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