The Exception

Mistake number-one was assuming I had outsmarted my fellow man by embarking on an early-morning trip to the supermarket the Sunday before Thanksgiving. If not packed, the store was aflutter with shoppers guilty of the same ill-considered thinking as I.

Long lines emanated from the few registers the store thought it suitable to open. And being twenty-first century Americans, we were, of course, suitably distressed.

With a miniature cart barely contaminated by groceries, I opted for the express check-out lanes, which were easy to find owing to the sizeable signs proclaiming 'Express Lane 15 Items Or Less'. In my naivete, I assumed that a line of small purchases would move faster than a line of large ones.

(At least my first mistake wouldn't be lonely.)

When it dawned on me that I had been eying the racks of impulse items and gossip magazines for an unduly long time, I looked to the front of the line.

There, a stylish middle-aged woman in black boots, sporting a modern, asymmetrical bob was stuffing the tiny counter with what seemed to be an approximation of the magician who pulls out unending yards of handkerchiefs from a breast pocket. Or the dozens of circus clowns who emerge from a single, tiny car.

The stream of groceries did not end.

I attempted to stare a hole in her, but my corneal lasers were in the shop undergoing recalibration. Unbelievably, her illiteracy (to be kind) was compounded by a desire to pay with a highly-unusual form of debit card which apparently originated in eastern Europe.

When the debit card problem was at last rectified, the harried cashier loaded three full-sized bags into her cart. With no acknowledgment that she had caused anyone any inconvenience whatsoever, the woman zipped up her tailored jacket, adjusted her scarf, pulled on her gloves and sauntered out of the store.

I issued a silent prayer, thankful that it wasn't Monday morning and this creature wouldn't be making me late for work. 

And that no one else felt the need to demonstrate their holiday shopping self-importance.