Why I Support the King Soopers Employees on Strike…A Day Late but Still Relevant
EDIT: There is a tentative deal in progress but my point remains and it is still work thinking and reading about. It's going to keep happening all over. It’s been a frustrating and dark couple [...]
The Grocery Manager: A Novel – Page One
Fluorescent bulbs hum disco in the background of this room bathed in a god-forsaken, harsh white light. My eyes water as they sit above facemask in a steambath consisting of hot breath and coffee. I’ve [...]
It Was Worth the Energy
I’ve travelled on this planet for nearly thirty-six, mostly-stable trips around the sun. I fell in love for the first time when I was twenty and I don’t really think I have since. Ten years [...]
On The Night of The Tragedy in Boulder
It was a busy day with a myriad of issues flowing in and out of my purview. Monday usually feels like a weekend day at my store. In between covering breaks, writing production and receiving [...]
Same Pandemic, Different Panic
A year ago, on this very weekend, everything and everyone was shuttered, crawling into quarantine with unknown repercussions on the other side. Uncertainty gripped most of the world. Conflicting reports of doomsday scenarios were announced [...]
Do More with Less
Every night, at work, I feel rushed or squeezed or pinched in some way, like god is my older sister trying to test my resolve until I snap. Either someone calls out, a customer becomes [...]
An Easy Year on The Grocery Line
This weekend marks my one year anniversary of working on the grocery line. Of course, when I started, I didn’t know it would be a “grocery line” or anything interesting in the abstract. I assumed [...]
The Vegan Buffalo Chicken Wrap
The store was dead. We were winding down and trying to close up for the evening. I was in the middle of writing the fresh pack production list for tomorrow when one of our team [...]
My First Thanksgiving On The Grocery Line
Thanksgiving is here and the holiday season is in full swing. The pandemic is still around trying to ruin all the fun and we are on a second lockdown in my city. Uncertainty still looms [...]
Drinking From The Fire Hose
After my ten day quarantine, only a few weeks of actually doing my current supervisor role, we are full on into the Class 5 hurricane that is the holiday season on the grocery line. We [...]
Ten Days of Quarantine
I travelled to meet my biological sister in Florida for the very first time last weekend. We had a blast. But it wasn’t a “real” vacation involving relaxation and forgetting about work while catching up [...]
Hey! It’s a Boy! Part Two
If you haven't done so, please read https://lifeonthegroceryline.com/2020/10/hey-its-a-boy/ before the post below. Otherwise, you might be a little lost. A time warp developed in my cubicle as I anticipated any number of possible replies she [...]
My Plan of Action for COVID Times and Beyond
The Pandemic has turned introspection into a way of life for me. Even at the onset of the lockdowns and uncertainty, I have tried to steer my path towards some sort of goal. If this [...]
Hey! It’s a Boy!
My teacher stood in front of the class and wrote a question on the chalkboard, "What is something that makes you feel special?” Our homework assignment for the night was to write an “essay” on [...]
The Longest Summer
When friends and family ask what I’m up to on any given night or on the weekend I usually respond, “I’m just laying low.” They give empathetic replies because for the most part they are [...]
When Everyone Is Jumping Ship
I am barely into the fourth week of my new position at the grocery cathedral and people are jumping ship. In a production meeting our manager informed us that almost everyone in a leadership position [...]
From Inside The Grocery Cathedral
I am two weeks into a different phase of my life on the grocery line. I moved into an inventory and receiving position for our prepared foods department. It’s a nice change of pace and [...]
Reflecting On My Grocery Line Hustle
In 2001, the world was entrenched in strange and uncertain times much like the one we find ourselves in nearly twenty years later. The tragedy started more localized in the United States but the effects [...]
Let’s Rally Around Essential Workers
At the beginning of the pandemic, I was optimistic that people would rally together for a greater good. I imagined that in the midst of great peril we would put aside our differences to help [...]
Love in the Time of COVID
How does one find love during a time when human contact can be deadly? That question is extremely dramatic, I know, but the enduring and ostentatious nature of its framing doesn’t negate from the fact [...]
Reflections – Finding Loved Ones In The Grocery Aisle
One of my first significant memories after coming online and engaging in the world around me happened in a grocery store. I was finally of the age where I could walk through the store on [...]
The Mask He Refused To Wear
Our freedoms feel significantly infringed upon as the pandemic expands in breadth and scope, and it makes you wonder about the validity of safety and freedom in theory and practice. It’s hard to know what [...]
Rekindling Humanity During The Pandemic
Over the last two weeks, my city has initiated the long process of re-opening. And along with business doors accepting grateful customers, goods and services being exchanged and people getting back to work in this [...]
Social Distance Dinner Party
I was going to write something about my city opening back up and everything returning to a sense of normalcy, but now we are on lock down again. There has been a curfew in effect [...]
The Mundane Apocalypse
Linda is back after being trapped with her family in a stunning estate for three weeks. Her cart is full of a few hundred dollars’ worth of organic and local groceries that she picked out [...]