Make soup!

This slice is a moment from about two weeks ago.

I’m walking through the Trader Joe’s produce aisle with a slight sense of urgency. Remember the stressful moment growing up when you and your parent finally made it to the checkout line and they forgot just that one thing? And said ‘oh, could you please run back and grab a can of sundried tomatoes?’ And you had no idea where on earth sundried tomatoes might be? Yeah? Well. I’m 28 and it’s still happening.

Mom and I are up at the checkout. Not next in line. Up. As in it is our turn. “Ah, shoot,” she says. (Shoot may have been spelled with an ‘i’ instead of two o’s.) My stomach sinks. You never want to hear your mom say shoot in the checkout line. “I forgot the fennel.”

I know my place in the grocery line relationship. It is not the line-stander card-holder. It is the sprinter-to-find-the-dang-fennel. I accept my defeat quickly, and take off. What does fennel look like again? Eh. Whatever. I know how to read, I’ll figure it out.

I’m furiously scouring all of the adorable Trader Joe’s produce tags when two women both reach for the bags of spinach. One of them laughs. “You know, it’s always the same thing with this spinach. I buy it, it sits in my produce drawer, I don’t eat it, it goes bad, I throw it away and I buy a new one.”

I roll my eyes. This story has become somewhat of a meme. The cyclical spinach buying. I hazard a glance over at the two of them. The one with the spinach story looks a little haphazard. Her hair needs a good brush and her pants are a couple sizes too big. The other woman is pristine. Her blonde hair is blown out and she’s dressed in head-to-toe Lululemon with a trendy puffer vest and sneakers I may need to look up later. She’s not going to give her the time of day. I think to myself.

“Oh! Ha, yes,” Lulu says. “Soup! Put the leftover spinach you haven’t eaten in soup. It cooks down so much - that way it never goes bad and always gets used.”

I am baffled. I was so, so wrong. In a moment where she could have been cold and distant to a stranger, Lulu completely shocked me by being warm, friendly, and even helpful.

I do not end up finding the fennel. Mom and I stop at Whole Foods on our way home.

——————

I’m still thinking about this moment two weeks later. I hate how surprised I was by a person’s kindness - and a large part of that was that I made an assumption about Lulu before she even spoke. I didn’t give her the benefit of the doubt. Next time someone tries to strike up a conversation with me over the bags of spinach, I will not roll my eyes. Instead, I will offer them Lulu’s sage advice. “Make soup!”