Evasion in the Grocery Store

 

I was bopping through the grocery store the other day when I caught a glimpse of someone. She was masked, and it was a quick glance, so I certainly could have been mistaken. But it flashed into my brain that this was the former principal of my child’s grade school. I wheeled around. I headed the other way. I put as much distance between her and myself as I could.

Let’s think about this: My last child’s last day at that school was in May of 2003. This principal was already gone by then. Come to think of it, she was in charge when my older child was there, and his last day was in May or 1999. So it’s at least 20 years since our paths crossed.

Needless to say, I did not like nor admire this woman. She established herself as a petty tyrant when she started. She disgusted our group of working woman moms by saying once, during what was supposed to be a free exchange of brainstorming ideas, “That’s the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard.” She irritated the mucus out of me when she started driving a bright red Lexus to school. I know, I know: I’m the petty one here.

Throw a stone at me if I am the only person guilty of evading someone in the grocery store.

Most of the time for me it’s when I see someone who might be a tiny bit chatty and I don’t want to linger. Sometimes it’s a person I just don’t like very much. I can’t say I scamper away because I’m not looking my well-groomed best. I gave up on that long ago.

Once in a while, though, it’s someone like this former principal. Someone I REALLY did not like. Years ago, I had a female boss who lived in my neighborhood. I would run into her in the grocery store from time to time. I left the company because I figured out she was kind of a narcissistic psycho. To this day – and here we’re talking 35 years later – if I glimpse someone resembling her, I do an about-face and head for the opposite end of the store.

What does this say about me? I’ve admitted in former blogs to being petty. I also freely confess to impatient, irritable, disdainful, etc. etc. Pet sins, each and every one of these.

And yet, what’s to be gained by taking the chance on a face-to-face encounter? It’s not going to make me revise my feelings about said person. If I haven’t rethought my antipathy in 30 years, it’s not going to happen while we’re selecting oranges together. It’s not going to raise my esteem in the other person’s eyes. I suspect one of the reasons I didn’t get along with such a one is because he/she didn’t like me, either.

No; I don’t think character building would occur. And besides. I’m usually in way too much of a hurry to chat.