People of Walmart

I really hate to have to admit that I spend a lot of time at Walmart, and an almost equal amount of time hating it.  It's not just about the money I spend there; in fact, the only reason I shop there is because who can afford to shop anywhere else? 

I don't make shopping lists very often, simply because I don't think to.  I always think I'm going to easily remember everything since I don't cook for myself and have a limited grocery list.  What happens, of course, is that I forget then remember things once I'm across the store from them, so I wind up criss-crossing the place several times per visit.  Good exercise, but bad for people interactions. Tonight, the same guy with a little girl in his cart nearly crashed into me no less than 5 times, all over the store.  But the one that took the cake was the lady with two children who were apparently getting matching brightly-colored plastic (are you ready for this?) megaphones.  And she was letting them use them, full volume, all....over....the......store. 

It was worse than any crying baby situation, ever---and I get really upset at those parents who bring babies to Walmart at night when they should be sleeping, and they cry as if their little hearts are breaking.  I just can't stand it.   But this, this:  it was must have been something like the Manuel Noriega-music torment, where the US military blasted his house with really loud music non-stop for a while.  These children were shouting nothing bad into the megaphones (and thank God; that would just have been a bridge too far), but they were SO LOUD!!!  YES, JUST LIKE I'M YELLING AT YOU IN CAPITALS RIGHT NOW!!  It went on, and on, and on.  They were in the aisle next to me for what seemed to be an ice age.  I could hear other people in nearby aisles discussing the noise, too.

It was just one of those situations when I find myself taking a look around and feeling there's almost no hope for the human race.  Yet, when I got to the checkout, I was furiously throwing gallons of water on the checker's conveyor belt, when the lady in line behind me picked up something off the floor and handed it to me:  a bottle of my Koolaid drops I carry everywhere that had apparently fallen out of the cart.  I would never have seen it on my own. 

It was such a small thing, yet it restored my faith in people, if only for tonight.  Oh people of Walmart, may you never humiliate yourself more than you can stand; may you never offend the rest of us more than we can endure.