Grocery Stores

A lot of my life has revolved around grocery stores. Many of the inside jokes between my mom and I were spawned at the First National in Brewster or the Pathmark in Danbury, and later at the Krogers, H.G. Hills and Piggly Wiggly in Nashville. (Right here, I could stop and veer off on a tangent entitled "North and South : Compare and Contrast Grocery Shopping Cultures"). My favorite Erma Bombeck column involved the grocery cart that had three wheels that wanted to go shopping and one wheel that wanted to go to the parking lot. We spend most of our lives sleeping. The second biggest chunk of my life has doubtlessly been spent in grocery stores.

I have learned lessons at the grocery store. Slower traffic stays right, pass on the left. Don't walk in front of a 10 year old who is pushing the buggy. Patience and a smile go a long way. Dress in layers. Milk is always in the corner farthest from the door. Check the eggs before you commit to them. Nothing is ever as good inside as it's packaging would make you believe. Most of the time, blue is not a color you want to eat. If you go to the grocery wearing the YMCA t-shirt that has the spaghetti sauce stain dribbled down the front, there is a 100% chance that you will run into the freshly coiffed high dollar neighbor wearing her mink.

God sometimes chooses to give me moments of absolute clarity about my life when I'm at the grocery store. Maybe it's because I'm there so much. A few weeks ago, there was a mom and her daughter getting out of the suburban. The mom was lifting the daughter out, they were giggling and rubbing noses... Don't get me wrong, I'm not weepy or nostalgic about my older girls growing up. Yet, there was a moment - I panicked - was I ever like that? Did I ever giggle like that with my daughters? Did I rub noses with them and lift them up like that? If I did, in that moment I was absolutely sure I that didn't do it enough.

Today at the grocery store I saw a younger-ish (not too young) woman with a small-ish (not too small) child and an olderish (not too old) woman. The ages I guess weren't as important as the roles they played, the youngish woman was out shopping with her mom and her child. The youngish woman was the one who needed the groceries, and the mom and kid were along for the ride. There are often women like this, with their children and their moms, all shopping together. In my mind, I've always seen myself as the younger women - not the moms. Today at the grocery store, for the first time, as clear as day, in my mind I became the mom. In a split second and just like that, my frame of reference and my idea of who I am shifted .... just along for the ride.

Funny.... The way it is...

There was an article in our town news on Wednesday. It was interesting in a couple of ways.

Here is a part of it.

" Marcus High School is one step closer to having a football stadium with a 4-1 vote by the Flower Mound Planning and Zoning commissioners on Monday.
Commissioners approved a variety of waivers for the plan, including allowing all overhead utilities to remain.
... G & A Consultants Engineer Von Beougher said burying the utilities would cost the (LISD) more than $1 million.
'That's $1 million in improvements -- if you want to call them improvements -- that really wouldn't serve any educational value to the students,' Beougher said."

Hmm. Where to begin?

Maybe with some pictures...
















These are just a few of the power lines that the builder doesn't want to bury.





















This monstrosity is in our back yard.

I don't know whether this spider web of cables that runs the length of Waketon Blvd has anything to do with it, but our power historically goes out on a cloudy day. I'm pretty sure I want to call "burying the cables" an improvement.
















































This is the construction zone where work has already begun on the new football stadium that has not yet been approved by the Flower Mound P&Z. The baseball stadium has been dismantled, and the state of the art practice field that was built 7 or 8 years ago at a cost of several million dollars has been dug up.


I'm not sure how a new football stadium is serving any educational value to the students, but if your going to spend $35 million on one, couldn't you just bury the cables while you're at it?

Don't even get me started on where the people to fill the 9500 seats are going to park within walking distance of the intersection of Waketon and Morriss...

Thoughts...

1. DD #4 is a newly minted HS grad. As such, we have agreed to send her on a long-awaited trip to Africa with Cross Cultural Solutions, a "recognized leader in the field of international volunteering". Air travel options to get from DFW to Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, involve stops in either New York or Amsterdam. I suggested that the change in Amsterdam is probably better than changing in NY, the flight is half as long, and JFK is not the most user friendly airport. DD#4 responds "Yeah, I think that's better"..... "Where's Amsterdam?" (!!)

2. We now have egg-producing chickens. This item started out to be a comment about my worrying alot lately about trying to reconcile my liberal socio-political views of life in our country with my living as a christian in a right-wing, intensely conservative part of our country. My worrying, my desire to cling to what I've always felt was "right" and "just", and my understanding that my feelings about these things are in direct conflict with what most christians I associate with feel about these things - have all led me to question my christianity, and then back to questioning my need to cling to these views (pride?! again?!). But then, I chickened out about commenting on this at all, and wrote about my chickens instead.

3. VBS rocks. I've really enjoyed getting to know everyone involved in making it happen this year. We have a Children's Ministries director who is leaving that I will miss working with more often. She gave me gold stars. We have a new Children's Ministries Director that I look forward to working with more often. He asks me for feedback, and for what I think. I've had several opportunities this week to be a good listener - something I'm notoriously bad at. I hope that I have been of some comfort to these people. One final observation about this: The kids/teens/young adults that serve at VBS are incredible. Each and every one of them.

4. Pine Cove is a little slice of heaven on earth. I love that they love my kid so dearly each summer for a week full of guy-bonding, and seeking God. DS#1 always comes back with a renewed understanding of God's love, his power, and of what his purpose is here. He would just say he had a great time, but his attitude and renewed faith from this week never fail to lift me up and renew my own faith. One final observation about this: The young adults that serve at Pine Cove are incredible. Each and every one of them.

5. In writing this, I realize that just when I find myself the farthest away from God (see item 2), he finds the most indirect ways to bring me back to him (see item 3 and 4). I have loved serving Him through his church this week at VBS, and I have loved being served by Him through other believers. I realize that the key to all of these things - VBS, Pine Cove, Cross Cultural Solutions - is the joyful, active, optimistic idealism of kids/teens/young adults - the pure love of one person for another person - without guilt or baggage or judgement or condemnation or agendas or the need to be right or for someone else to be wrong that seems to be so prevalent in our "tribe" lately - more specifically - since January 20, 2009.

6. I realize that times like these - the great VBS experience, or the perfect summer camp experience, and shiny, happy, joyful, optimistic (!!), idealistic teens/twenties, or the times when (to quote some great teens I know) "God Shows Up" - are rare. So, today, I am thoroughly grateful and blessed.

7. My drier is buzzing. I'm off to fold clothes, with joy and optimism.