At the Island Grocers: circa 2010

Sunday, May 30, 2010

At the Island Grocers

4:20 A beautiful girl picked out a soda from the wall to wall cooler in front of me. I stared at her, and when she turned around and saw me, she stopped suddenly, as if she had remembered something.

Later I hear her talking to the cashier.

“It’s a crazy world.”

“But it keeps on spinning.”

She walked out of the freezing grocery store.

4:39 I have to get it all written out now while it’s still fresh. Like the produce behind me in isle 5.

This whole place smells. Like plastic and melted Haagen-Dazs  ice cream bars. There’s a hint of… Fish.

On the TV a beautiful woman is interviewing Bill Nye the Science Guy about the oil spill in the gulf.

My stomach turns.

All those poor fish.

5:12 As I write people come and go from the small chairs at the table I am sitting at, some steal glances at me:

A city boy.

And fresh faced.

A red faced old man sat in a chair across from me earlier. He sipped coffee and talked to everyone who came in. He knew all their names, and asked about their kids.

This is a small island.

5:27 The front door is casually left open. I can see outside into the rain. I can just make out the tree line of the main land across the straight.

5:34 I make and break eye contact a lot. I looked away from a bearded man’s face and stared at his six-pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon. It was hanging loosely from his hand. I imagined six little seagulls hanging dead from the plastic rings.

Covered in that oil.

5:40  There isn’t a lot of food here. The smoked fish fridge has one pepperoni stick in it.

5:48 The TV says that there are rising tensions in the Koreas after a South Korean warship was sunk. A lot of shit goes down in the ocean. While I see images of the warship being salvaged from the sea I can smell ocean brine coming through the open door.

5:51 Some girls walk by and peer into a fridge. They are mildly attractive.

“I guess we could get some soda if anyone at the party doesn’t want beer”

“Well what should we get, some coke?”

“Everyone likes sprite, lets get that.”

5:58 All the women are aging in front of me. Even the young ones. I can hear the sea salt drying up their bodies. Their faces will all look like carved driftwood in time.

6:10 An old man with a long beard and round coke bottle glasses walks into the store. His face is weathered and kind. He is Father Time.

6:15 I understand now that I am an outsider because I don’t have side burns and beach sand under my fingernails.

How I wish I had side burns.

6:17 The guy looking into the empty ice cream cooler looks cracked out.

Someone is smoking outside. I can’t smell the fish anymore.

6:23 The cigarette smell is still wafting in. It smells like cheap, down-on-your-luck cigarettes.

6:28 All the signs here are hand painted. Hand sharpie to be exact. One above the frozen dinner section reads:

JUICES

There are five Welch’s bottles. What else could the sign be referring to?

Gastric Juices?

6:31 In the gift shop around the corner there is a steel drum. I hear people play it every once and a while. It makes lone Caribbean notes in the dreary northwest.

It’s unwholesome.

6:32 The man at the checkout counter with a John Deer hat is looking at me funny. Maybe he knows.

6:33 Its time to leave.