7. Happy New Year — This Is Bullshit!
The Year of Paying Attention
(The Year of Paying Attention is the story of 13 months, December 2016 through December 2017. Names have been changed. I know 13 months is not technically a year.)
It was early New Year’s Day, the city streets quiet, the pricey gourmet market mostly deserted, as I sought some humanely raised, ethically butchered pork for dinner. I’d been tempted to buy meat at the less expensive store where I got the vegetables, but I thought, isn’t this the whole point? Not supporting factory farming by not buying factory-raised meat? Plus I’d already taken martyr credit with a text to Sarah, describing my wandering all over looking for what she wanted. She doesn’t virtue signal. She just won’t eat something that was tormented on its way to her plate.
My search led me into a market that provides a uniquely Upper East Side experience. My first-generation Irish Catholic mother, born and raised in the dying mill town of Lawrence, Massachusetts, would have taken one look at what they charge for a bag of cheese crisps, shot me her “is this a mistake or are you crazy?” look, and walked out, steamed that somebody would try to take advantage of people who work for a living. Almost thirty years ago, having flown from Boston with my father to meet their baby granddaughter Ellen, Mary Warfield stood patiently on line in a somewhat less obnoxious grocery while the customer at the register made a federal case about some price discrepancy.
My mother returned to our apartment with her selections, and told us of her adventure, and retold it for years thereafter, about how the checkout crisis persisted and the line lengthened, and a nice old lady standing in front of my nice old mother turned to her and suggested with a quiet smile, “Why don’t we just shoot ourselves?” My mother loved that story because it captured her idea of New York City — in the midst of aggravation that would go unacknowledged back home in New England, someone had made a joke about what everyone was thinking.
I realized I’m now as old as my mother was on that stalled checkout line, as I trundled my compassionate pork towards the cash register, shuffling through a sea of ridiculous confetti, ducking under party balloons, and wondering whose idea it was to decorate the aisles as if the New Year’s party of the decade had taken place among the fancy olives and exotic cookies. Just ahead, a drama was developing.
A thin, elderly lady in an oversized puffy winter coat, knit hat pulled over her ears, was propelling her cart towards a register, while a less elderly lady hovered nearby, talking, perhaps generally, perhaps to herself, perhaps to a store person, maybe even to me, if I was interested. I cautiously removed my earbuds to hear what was going on.
Two female store employees stood near the registers, faces composed and neutral, a requirement for working in a store like this. The clientele is frequently rude and demanding, presuming that prices this high entitle them to behave like offended royalty. The younger old lady seemed to have violated the rules of checkout order, and the puffy coat lady wasn’t having it.
“This is bullshit!” said the puffy coat. Her nemesis wasn’t arguing, only looking around for moral support. The puffy coat pushed her cart from one register to another, mad as a wet hen. The two employees remained neutral, one murmuring into a phone, the other coaxing a register to wake up.
“It’s bullshit!” Puffy repeated, pivoting to rally her own base. I was the only candidate, the employees as neutral as Switzerland. I tucked one earbud into one ear to assert my own neutrality while staying abreast of the developing situation. I can’t say why, but it was thrilling to hear the bad language.
It’s not even noon on the first day of the New Year, I thought, and this entitled, foul-mouthed doyenne is jockeying for an embolism. I paid exorbitantly for my pork, and walked into the sun of the new day, silently wishing the angry lady well, although I doubted she’d regain her composure anytime soon. Perhaps she was thinking, “Why don’t we just shoot ourselves?”
***
Unlike me, Sarah has a low tolerance for heated discord. Any level of raised-voice conflict qualifies as “fighting,” which we don’t do much — at least in my opinion. When we do and she protests, I think — You call this fighting? I could show you fighting. Eventually I simmer down, feel ashamed, get a grip, apologize for getting mad, and resolve to stop flying off the handle.
I’ve learned there’s no need to panic whenever Sarah says “There’s something I want to talk about with you.” For awhile I’d anticipate the next phrase was probably, “This isn’t working for me,” or “I hate New York and don’t want to live here anymore,” or “I’ve met an Italian physicist who plays the violin.” I’d steel myself, and Sarah would explain that she was no longer going to buy popcorn at the movies except at the Film Forum where it’s real butter, or declare the time had come to throw away some fraying, yellowed towels heaped in the closet.
Next week: So, What Do You Do?
