Razors and Thyme

When I die & go to hell, I think it will be a lot like the supermarket I went to today. The quest for new face razors and thyme for tonight's red beans & rice took me to four different stores today. Dollar stores have a fair selection of spices usually but thyme was not on hand at either store.

Though I must have already driven by the supermarket several times, I had not realized it existed until I saw the crowd of cars parked outside.

"Supermarket" is not the right word. It may have been super 29 years ago, but it was clearly down on hard luck. This was where the poor people shopped for their processed meats. Upon entering, I was already in a long line filing through the first lane. There were hard looks & hostility everywhere. Angry children and long distant dreams on the blank faces of their parents. These are the people who know the old lady I saw at the bus stop with the walker & all the plastic shopping bags in the ninety-seven degree heat. These are my neighbors.

They plowed through the emptier aisles using their carts like battering rams. I found thyme at last, already ground down but better than nothing. It was then that I noticed the music pouring from the ceiling;

"Yeah we've got to start lookin at the time we've been given

If this is all we got then we better start thinkin'

If every second counts on a clock that's tickin'

Gotta' live like we're dying"

Pouring from the ceiling like Zyklon B. It felt like the music was deliberately mocking everyone in the store. Jesus Christ...

The lines to the cash register were backed up into the aisles with this dense crowd of need. All feeling the same heat & hostility. Living. Dying. Muscles and minds and souls in this pit of atrophy on a Sunday afternoon before the work week starts all over again.

I put the thyme back where I found it and walked home content that I had found razors at the second dollar store.