Getting Out Of Our Usual Neighborhood

It started like a normal Saturday… sleeping in (past 6:15 AM is sleeping in for me!), buzzing my head (weekly chore to keep the sides nice and tight – the top does that all by itself!), and chatting with my wife as she relaxed at home without having to go to work.

We finished setting up the guestroom where Liz had had a bedroom for about 10 years, and I decided to head out for a bit of Christmas shopping (or at least Christmas "window" shopping).

I stopped by the recycling center – no problem. I headed for my local Wawa for a turkey hoagie (for those not around here: Wawa is a terrific quick-stop convenience store chain started in the Philadelphia, PA USA area – many now are pretty large, dispensing gasoline too. And "hoagie" is a sub sandwich) but the parking lot was so full I drove on.

Often at this time of the year I head for Walmart. Something about strolling around a huge place like the one a few miles from my home lets me stay in touch with what is being sold in various departments AND stay in touch with lots of types of people. Walmart seems to attract people across so many different lines (economic, racial and ethnic, etc) and I learn something every time I'm there. (One of my marketing gurus, Dan Kennedy, used to watch Roseanne and Jerry Springer just to stay in touch with "real Americans" and my trips to Walmart does a similar thing for me.)

Since I couldn't stop for a turkey hoagie in my usual Wawa, I stopped at the Wawa close to the Walmart.

The woman (with her young son) in checkout line ahead of me used a card I hadn't seen before. I could plainly read ACCESS on the card when the cashier took it to another machine to process it.

"Oh, you can use this for that sandwich… it's been toasted. You have to use cash for that."

Then I figured it out: ACCESS is the way, at least in Pennsylvania, USA, that the state gives money for what people used to call Food Stamps. No longer are "stamps" sent through the mail; people use these special cards to access their "accounts" when they need to purchase items.

"I'm sorry… that's just the way the system is set up," said the cashier, helpless to do anything to help the woman and her son (who wanted the sandwich).

"Ma'am," I said to the cashier, "I'll pay for that sandwich." The little boy's eyes opened wider as he looked at me.

I just kept thinking that the woman had made a mistake, one she didn't even know she was making. And I kept wondering: "Just because something is toasted, does the state not feel that is food? Or, are they only supposed to use cards like this for staples to take home?"

I'd like to think I would do something like this even if it WEREN'T this holiday season. And all I could say to the woman and her son, when she turned to say, "Thank you very much," was "Merry Christmas."

Was my usual Wawa's parking lot full SO THAT I would meet this woman and her son? Did I decide to go in the direction of Walmart SO THAT I'd meet this woman and her son? Was the feeling I had inside and the lesson I learned (about being open to those around me) what led me today.

Probably so.

Amazing what the energy around us will do for us when we are open to it…

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