Dancing Shopper, Health Club Owner, Healthy Eating and Me

Monday I took a vacation day in order to take my mom to a doctors appointment. After her appointment, we had planned to stop by her favorite fabric store, unfortunately they were closed on Mondays! Who does that? Who closes on a Monday?? So instead we went to JoAnns Fabrics and Michaels. 

I also made a stop at WinCo, my favorite grocery store. They make the best chicken strips. I meant to buy only chicken strips, but you know how it is, you end up picking up all kinds of stuff along the way. So my chicken strips cost me $178.43 because that was my total bill! Crazy the way things add up!

I was waiting in line to pay, taking care to stand on the pre-marked  social distancing markers and I was getting a bit irritated because the older gentleman in back of me was breathing down my neck. No matter how much I moved forward, he was right behind me. I know elderly people sometimes forget that we are supposed to socially distance, I know my mom does...so I was trying to be patient but in my head I was super angry and frustrated.

Ahead of me in the line was a young couple and the young man was dancing the sort of dance I remember doing in my youth called The Robot...only he made it look good! So I focused my attention on him and he was awesome and entertaining and the female was so embarrassed and trying to stop him, it was so amusing!

Then I hear the old guy behind me say "I think you almost got that dance move down!" And the young man just burst into laughter and his girlfriend/wife turned red. They then started a  fun conversation and both were so entertaining. The old guy told him to keep moving as it's good for your health and the young guy told him to keep drinking water and remember to stay hydrated and the old guy said "Oh, I know. I've been a health instructor my whole life and in fact I own a health gym and health food store downtown." The young guy said "My bad, I don't need to tell you how to stay healthy then do I?" At the end when the young couple had to leave the young man turned back to the old man and said "Much respect to you sir, it was a pleasure to speak to you." 

It was a pleasure for me to be in the middle of this conversation and I turned and smiled at the old guy and noticed he only had 2 items and my cart was full, so I asked him if he wanted to go ahead of me and he said, "No, that's ok, I got all the time in the world, I just came from a doctors appointment and I live up in the mountains and have a long drive ahead of me and then when I get home all I'm going to do is sit down in front of the TV and rot." I told him that I could hardly wait until the day arrived when I could just sit and rot instead of doing all this grocery shopping. He assured me that I didn't want that day to come and started telling me about his wife that had passed away last year and how much he missed her and how he recently had a hip replacement and he was doing physical therapy and that's why he was in town today.  

I had started to unload my shopping cart and was mortified because it was filled with frozen pizza, chicken strips, ice cream, potato chips, cookies, Little Debbie Snack Cakes, diet Pepsi and beer! The healthiest thing I pulled out of the cart was milk and eggs, at least my milk was 2%! I just felt the old man staring at all my garbage food and looking at those 10-Coronavirus pounds I'd put on and judging me. But honestly I don't think he even noticed, he was so busy telling me the story of his life and I realized that's why he didn't go ahead of me in line, he was looking forward to getting into a conversation with anyone, he was lonely. 

He told me that in 17 years he would be 100, that was a weird way to tell me he was 83. I told him my mom was 82. By then I was done paying for my groceries and he told me, "When you get home young lady, you take one of those beers and you sit down and enjoy it, you've earned it!" I told him I sure would and bagged my groceries and headed out to my car. I could hear him as I left talking to the person behind him, making sure he got in all the conversation he could before he went home to sit and rot. 

There's no moral of the story here, just a reminder to enjoy life even when you're lonely and only have 17 years left before you get to 100. Talk to strangers, make people laugh, make a tired mom feel good by calling her a "young lady" and remember to not become a grumpy old person but continue enjoying life and those around you...ok, maybe there was a moral to this story after all. 

"Life is about moments. Don't wait for them, Create them."

 -Anonymous