WAL-MART. SUPER.

By Patrick Shawn Bagley

They opened up a new Super Wal-Mart in a town near mine. I avoided going there for several months, but all roads lead to Wal-Mart. When you’re one of the “working poor,” you can’t afford to take the roads that go anyplace else. Actually, the road led to the biggest expanse of asphalt I’ve ever seen. The dinosaurs had their tar pits; we’re going to smother ourselves in hot top. This parking lot was so large the store had a shuttle bus to take you from your vehicle to the entrance, just like those airport rental car agencies. I should have turned back right there, but the shuttle was air-conditioned. I’m a sucker for air-conditioning.

Once I got inside, I ducked behind a group of Canadian tourists to get out of the usual small talk with the nonagenarian greeter. I’m not into small talk; if you have nothing more interesting than the weather to talk about, then do me a favor and just keep quiet. The Canadians spoke to me, but that was okay. I don’t mind talking to foreigners. In fact, I prefer there be a language barrier in all my conversations. That way no one ever expects the things I say to make the least bit of sense.

I said vaya con juevos to my new Canadian friends and set off to explore this new place. My first mistake—aside from going in there at all—was failing to get a trail map. The three-mile hike from the front doors to the back of the store almost killed me. I looked for a lean-to like you’d find along the Appalachian Trail but had no luck. A handicapped guy drove past me on one of those little battery-powered shopping carts. I put my thumb out, hoping he’d give me a lift. He stopped at the end of the next aisle and looked back. So I took a deep breath and starting jogging over there, figuring I had a ride. But when I was a few feet behind him, he gave me the finger and peeled rubber down the aisle.

I was only there to buy Goldfish. Not the kind that swim around in a bowl a few days before they go belly up and end up swirling down a different kind of bowl. I mean the Pepperidge Farm Goldfish crackers. I have two daughters; one is seven years old and the other’s almost two. Little kids love those crackers. The Goldfish are supposed to taste like cheddar cheese. I think they taste like cardboard sprinkled with celery salt, but what do I know? My girls love them and that’s all that counts. In fact, if the baby had her way, she would eat nothing but Goldfish crackers, string cheese, broccoli, and ketchup. Those first three things are her favorite foods, and she loves to drown all of them in the fourth.

I ask her, “Sarah, what do you want for lunch?”

Sarah says, “Ketchup.”

Actually, what she says is more like, “Chechup.” We’re still working on those k sounds.

Something in the building was messing up my GPS, and it took me an hour to locate the grocery area, which was bigger than my town’s entire business district. It was weird to see the tire center right next to the meat department. There were racks of ladies’ underwear across the aisle from the canned goods, and toilet seats near the produce.

I walked down the main aisle, looking down all the side aisles and reading the signs to see what was there. Down at the end, I found one sign promising Party Snacks and another that listed Salty Snacks. Hmm. The Goldfish crackers taste like nothing but salt to me. On the other hand, I’ve seen people serve them at parties. I’d already wasted too much of my life just getting to this aisle, so I decided to check them both out.

Party Snacks: packages of potato chips the size of Blue Seal grain bags, twenty feet of shelves devoted to Chex Mix…no Goldfish. Salty Snacks: pretzels, popcorn, peanuts in fifty-five-gallon drums with patent-pending resealable lids, beer nuts, cashews, mixed nuts, potato stix, chocolate-flavored low-calorie microwave popcorn…no Goldfish.

I sent up a signal flare in the hope that someone wearing one of those reassuring blue vests would come rescue me. That should become a new crayon color; Wal-Mart Blue or maybe Sam’s Choice Blue. Anyway, an associate showed up after half an hour. He was a young guy, probably just out of high school, with a shaved head and misspelled tattoos all up and down his arms.

“Yeah?” he said, showing me his chewing gum. It was as blue as his vest.

I said, “I’m trying to find Goldfish crackers.”

The guy jerked his head forward, pointing the way with his chin. “They’re right down the end of the aisle there. On the big display. Can’t miss it.”

I turned around and almost soiled myself. There, at the far end of my aisle—so big I had walked right past it a dozen times without really seeing it—were hundreds of five-pound boxes of Pepperidge Farm Goldfish crackers, stacked one on top of the other to form a twelve-foot-high monument. The orange, white, and gold boxes glowed beneath the fluorescent lights.

Feeling stupid, I looked back at the associate and said, “Thanks. While I’ve got you here, can you tell me where the organic food section is?” I’m trying to lose a few…dozen…pounds and eat safer food (even though I still feed my kid those chemical crackers).

He scratched an open sore on his forearm. “I dunno, man,” he said. “I only work in the snack section. Ask Cathy in frozen foods, she might know who to ask.” Then he walked away.

If the people who worked there didn’t know where to find things, I wasn’t going to take any more chances. I pulled two boxes of Goldfish from the tower and did some quick warm-up exercises for the long trek to the checkouts.

The lines were long, but the store had three “self-service” registers. Theoretically, customers can scan and bag their own purchases, pay with cash or a credit card, and walk out without having to talk to a human being. Theoretically. In reality, there was a cashier helping every single “self-service” customer.

I opted to wait in one of the regular lines. I’d already been in the store long enough to need a shave, a haircut, and a driver’s license renewal, so what did a few more hours matter? When the cashier asked me if I’d found everything I needed, I just kept my mouth shut and forked over the cash for my crackers.

On the way out, I set off the security alarm. That happens to me about every third time I’m in a Wal-Mart, so I stood there with my receipt in hand, waiting for an associate to come and inspect my bag.

The greeter was a different old lady; apparently there’d been a shift change while I wandered through the retail wilderness, dodging falling prices. This one was about five feet tall and moved like the Tasmanian Devil, whirling and slobbering. I held my receipt out to her, but she leapt up and head butted me. Go ahead and laugh if you like, but a hard knock from an Aqua Netted beehive hairdo can poke your eye out.

Fearing the kind of damage her gnarled fingers could do in a body-cavity search, I dropped the receipt and swung the bag of Goldfish. It hit her right upside the head. There was a satisfying crunch that could have come from the crackers or her shellacked hair. Either way, I’d smacked her a good one and was getting out of there. I jumped on the shuttle as it was pulling away from the curb and never looked back. Next time I need something, I’ll just drive into Madison and go to Reny’s.  

 

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