Miracle on Aisle 10

It was a busy morning at Walmart. Christmas is coming and old people are shopping, a week before Christmas.  I am busily dragging my rattling old bones up and down the grocery aisle looking for candied pineapple for Miss Sheila's take on my Honeymama's fruitcake. I have described my grandmother's fruitcake in detail and posted the recipe.

Honeymom's fruitcake is unique in that it doesn't use citron, that pungent, sharp tasting heaven only knows what kind of fruit it originally was. It's a mild, gently flavored, dense fruitcake and every time Sheila makes one for someone, she has to add another fruitcake to the annual batch. Her brother-in-law told her he'd buy the ingredients if she'd make him a fruitcake for his birthday.One thing it does use is candied pineapple. Now I had ordered all the ingredients well ahead of time through Amazon.com.  But I was short on the pineapple, so I tried to find some at Walmart.

To my horror there was nothing on the shelves at Walmart in the way of fruitcake ingredients. I tried two Walmart employees and they couldn't help either. Finally, I tracked down a manager who told me that this particular Walmart had stopped carrying fruitcake fruit because it didn't sell well enough. "But," she said, following me out of the checkout line where she was running a register like the managers often do when it gets busy, "I'm really not supposed to do this, but try down at WinCo. They carry everything."  She looked around then whispered conspiratorially, "I shop down there a lot myself."

It was like Macy's Santa recommending a customer go shop at Gimbel's in the old movie "Miracle on 34th Street".   I've been a great defender of Walmart in the past because they do make my life easier and more affordable. I do, however, recognize the limitations of a big box store like Wally World and in those limitations lies opportunity for local mom and pop stores to fill in the gaps. They have lower overhead and with a little advertising they can make themselves available to customers by stocking things Walmart doesn't.

I was glad to see a Walmart manager willing to violate company policy to help a customer. Restored my faith in Walmart. They don't do everything, but if you're smart you can figure out how to best use Walmart to your advantage and there really are some lovely people who work there.

© 2019 by Tom King

 

Anthropological Studies Down at the Walmart Parking Lot

(c) 2012 by Tom King

Plenty of people have weighed  in opinions of Wal-Mart and its customers. Comedians, pop psychologists, community organizers and armchair anthropologists have ridiculed and/or looked down their noses at the folk who congregate at the Wal-Mart. You will notice that I myself place the definite article "the" in front of "Wal-Mart" as is the general usage throughout the South. I suppose we do that unconsciously to identify THE Wal-Mart as opposed to would-be Wal-Marts like K-Mart, Target and Gibson's Discount Centers.

Wal-Mart is something of a barometer of local lower middle class culture in any community. And since the folk who live below the median 50% of the economic classes tend to be the primary Wal-Mart shoppers, it is fair to say that you could likely find a fairly representative sample of mainstream Americans by observing folk who shop at Wally World.

For instance, this morning I discovered a difference between Wal-Marts in Washington State and Texas that points to a difference in the two cultures or at least in how the cultures react to an outside stimulus - in this case snow. I come from Texas. When it snows in Texas everyone goes to the Wal-Mart and buys enough food and supplies to survive an apocalypse. For some reason we also buy huge packages of toilet paper. The parking lot of the Wal-Mart is inevitably packed with pickups and SUVs the moment more than a handful of snowflakes begin to fall.  Not sure why. Perhaps we're expecting massive power failures and want to have plenty of perishable food on hand if it does. Then, of course, when the power fails, we'll have to eat all the perishable food right quick before it perishes because the refrigerator will go out without power and then we're really going to need plenty of extra toilet paper you can bet on it.

This morning the ground was covered with snow, the roads were icy and, of course, my brother-in-law and I noticed we were low on bread. So, off we went to the Wal-Mart or just plain Wal-Mart as it's known up here in the Seattle area.  I fully expected to see the parking lot jammed, but to my surprise there appeared to be fewer people than usual in the store. Cashiers were standing idle waiting for customers - something I'd never seen at the South Hill Wal-Mart.

When snow starts falling Daisy and I get an urge to play in it.

Apparently, people in Washington do not feel the need to go out and drive in the snow if it's not absolutely necessary. The don't really need a lot of toilet paper when it snows either. The few people who were there were buying DVDs and snack food and stuff like that.

They say familiarity breeds contempt. I suppose as often as they get snow around here, the folk don't think they have to get in supplies  every time there is a flurry. 

Me, I'm carrying my trusty Swiss Army knife and a cigarette lighter (I don't smoke) with me at all times while there is snow in the air or on the ground.  I can still build a lean-to and start a fire with wet wood. I'm ready for whatever the Pacific Northwest can throw at me. Except for maybe that volcano over across the valley.

I wonder if the Wal-Mart parking lot would fill up if Mt. Ranier erupted?  I'll go check it out if it does and let you know.

Tom King - Puyallup, WA, late of East Texas