Surrounded

11.13.17

I don’t love shopping. In my family, Jonathan, my recently-deceased husband, was the one who loved to venture forth to see what treasures he could glean from the world. The man could tell you where the frilled cocktail toothpicks were in every grocery store in a twenty-mile radius.

Not me. The bigger the store, the more fatigued I feel. (Home Depot just makes me dizzy.) I plot my course through these places with precision, like a diver with low oxygen. I need THESE THREE THINGS and let’s hope no one gets in my way…

So I hadn’t been to Target since I began working with Chip, the nutritionist at Body Dynamics in Falls Church, VA, maybe four or five months ago. And I had to go yesterday (because I’ll Amazon Prime a lot of things, but two modest soap dispensers for the kitchen seemed beyond the pale somehow).

And I was astonished.

There was Bad Choices food EVERYWHERE.

Simply masses of it, and in places where you might expect you’d be safe. Capping aisles. Spilling into the travel lanes. Heaped on shelves.

Sugar. Chocolate. Pretzels glistening on their little carousel. Their tiny hands reached out imploringly, wistful smiles hiding those baboon fang grins. “You remember us! Don’t you love us any more? Just slip a few of us into your basket – you know you want to!”

I walked through that place like Van Helsing with a cross.

(Not handsome Hugh Jackman Van Helsing in an improbable Stetson/Fedora hybrid – no, more like nervous Anthony Hopkins Van Helsing.)

I made it out without being lured into the hypnotic gaze of vampiric sugar, but it was a near thing. How can all that stuff be just OUT there?? How can we – the Chip followers of the world – allow our fellow citizens to be thrown to the sugar wolves like that?!

Here’s a photo of Hugh as Van Helsing. I have a photo of the last round of groceries I bought at Whole Foods, but Lordy, it’s boring. Wouldn’t you rather look at Hugh? Sure. Who wouldn’t? You can bet HE doesn’t eat a lot of Bad Choice foods.

Bonus for nerds: Do you recognize Hugh’s funny, goofy sidekick Carl? That’s David Wenham, the guy who played noble, upright Faramir in the Lord of the Rings movies. Couldja DIE? Good character actor!