A Field Journal of Danger and Destitution: Or Grocery Shopping During the Covid-19 Pandemic*

March 14
Disaster has struck. The shelves that once held bread, ketchup, cereal, mac&cheese, noodles, frozen food and cans of soup, vegetables, and tomato products can only be identified by a lonely dented box, or a forlorn can. The "bath tissue" aisle is a barren wasteland. Shower scrubbies hanging from empty shelves are the forgotten banners of an abandoned battlefield.
Glory be! The fresh vegetables are untouched, and a few bags of tortillas remain.

March 24
Possibly, but unlikely infected, are we in danger? or are we the danger?
Don't over shop! But where are the people?
Signs posted everywhere warn of rationing. Only two boxes of eggs, containers of hand soap, and packages of toilet paper are allowed per person. Too bad those items have already been hunted to extinction.
Other signs proclaim a curfew to protect us? or them? from the ravenous hoards.

March 31
Fourteen days, and the danger has been neutralized.
War paint dispensers stand at the doors. Workers wipe down each cart touched by a human finger.
Cereal, and noodles have returned to the shelves.

April 3
Fellow combatants shield their faces. Lines are drawn in the sand.... on the floor, with tape.
Over the loud speaker they announce "Stay two carts away from each other or the world will die!"
Do we fear the enemy? or each other?

April 11
The war paint and the wipes have disappeared. A thin layer of plastic in the form of a loose plastic glove is all that stands between me and infection. I'll take infection.
Aisles have returned to normal except for that of the toilet paper. It remains a scar on the otherwise restocked shelves.
Mounds of water bottles sit untouched and ignored. Unless of course, they are gone by tomorrow.






*Sometimes fake drama is entertaining :)