Losing it over eggs...

Discovery
Originally uploaded by Expiring Mind

Thursday, September 04, 2008

Losing it over Eggs...

*Warning* This is really a short *story* lol. If you are looking for a short and peppy blog, move along... this is not the blog you are looking for...

It's Wednesday night; I'm on lunch from working at the school. To the bank to deposit and then on the Wal Mart, since I'd promised Henry cereal he wanted. I get to the checkout behind a couple and their 3 kids. The mom seems stressed and trying to keep her kids "in line." Really, they are fine--just being kids. Their purchase is separated into 3 groups: their regular food, and 2 separate WIC purchases. All the while the father is loading bags into the cart and talking to the mom. The mom is (in my opinion) hypersensitive about their behavior and just wanting to make the transaction smooth--which, for those of us who have ever had to use WIC know, it is not. You have to get just exactly what the voucher lists, in exactly the right ounce measurements, for exactly the right brands (and believe me--it changes from store to store, because you are required to purchase the store brands...) At the store, if another brand is on sale that week, you have to get it. For the longest time, you had to chose which one of you (if you actually have one of those strange two-parent households...) had to get the items for months on end, and that is the person who signed the left side of the vouchers--like a traveler's check--and then signed the right side at the store. You couldn't just choose which person to get it each time based on convenience. And if the manufacturer decides to throw in an additional 10% free, all bets are off... move to another type of cereal because that one is not going to fly under the WIC Radar; wrong number of ounces. Picture the Jedi mind trick: "This is not the cereal you are looking for..." Furthermore, if you want to use more than one voucher, you have to split them into separate orders, and the cashier rings them separately. Anyway, it seems like a lot of detail on this point, but that is the point--details. Imagine going to the store with kids in tow and trying to sort out this type of minutia. You still experience the normal frustrations of parenting, plus the stress of being financially strapped. Add to that the sighs, jeers, and nasty comments from the people waiting in line with their own problems, a sense of instant gratification the culture has encouraged and supported, and a sense of superiority, and you can see how this type of venture could be tense-- especially for people who want to better themselves, and not cause others undue delays.

So, back to our couple... The cashier, nicely, to his credit, says something about there not being eggs listed on the voucher (though they are in the sorted WIC pile.) The dad says to the mom lightheartedly, "Guess you're seeing things, huh?" "I guess so, " she says. They glace quickly at each other, and she indicates for the cashier to leave the eggs. I know that look. I have been a participant in that very exchange. (Makes you feel really good, too...not.) I am immediately transported back in time to the many health department windows--with inexperienced staff who are neither compassionate nor particularly efficient... "Next?" they call out with a voice stripped of feeling for the past several years. Some simply bored with their work, but some petty and spiteful, noting that you are 11 minutes late and the sign says if you are 10, you need to reschedule... Have they never had a blowout diaper just as they were about to leave the house? I remember the long waits--reminding myself that beggars can't be choosers--for the well child check ups required to get the vouchers at all...the time the worker--in her apparently infinite wisdom decided to prick Janey's finger for the hemoglobin count and then expect a crying child to willingly participate in an eye exam. The wait was hours, with "no food allowed." Days filled with some not very proud moments as a parent--one ending in a parking lot of a Kroger with me standing outside the car with a kicking, screaming child her car seat. It was the safest choice at the time...

The cashier finishes their transaction. I turn to the lady and ask, "Can I just buy you those eggs?" She says, "Oh, that's ok." I say, "No, really. You will never know how many times I have been in your spot. I'd like to." She looked at me, and in her eyes I saw her try to *merge* the concepts of the world she navigates with the unconditionally kind act of a stranger. She expressed a simple but sincere "thank you." I asked the cashier to ring up the eggs before my items, and he agreeably handed them to the lady. I felt fine as I was walking out the door, but as I approached the car, I started to tear up. I wiped them away because I couldn't understand why... It really wasn't a big thing at all. I was not sad. And I've never been prone to tears of happiness. Then I just allowed it to come over me. I started sobbing as I closed the car door and turned the key. Thoughts of all the years of poverty and all the ramifications and consequences of each of the decisions we made to "invest" in his school (ostensibly for a greater good...) came rushing into my head. It sounds like I was out of control. But actually, I think the opposite is true. I made the conscious effort to experience the pain. And in terms of grief, with the Kubler-Ross model, I'm at the end: acceptance.

Were the tears in the "acceptance of things I cannot change" category? Was it the acknowledgement of the senseless, pointless, needless suffering we had been through? Suffering is fine. It is necessary. It is unavoidable. It is strengthening. But needless suffering was a different story. I intuitively know I have to forgive. I don't want to. But I need to. Maybe not this minute, or even today. But I will. The mind is willing; the heart will have to follow when it is ready.