Once Upon a Time, I Didn’t Live at the Grocery Store

On Sunday, we got up bright and early to drive the kids up to Central Florida to meet my in-laws.  There, we handed the girls over for a 2 week stay with their grandparents.  TWO WEEKS.  I need not tell you how quiet my house is.  Trust me, after Everett goes to bed at 8:30 pm, you can hear a pin drop in this house.  And the gentle hum of the dishwasher that seems constant when the girls are around?  Not for another week and a half…although I still run it every now and again, just for old times sake (and baby bottles because they have to get clean some how).

Anyway, this morning I was driving to work and something seemed wrong.  You know that feeling that you’re forgetting something?  It was like that…but I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what it was.  As the day went on, I couldn’t shake the feeling.  Around lunch time, I realized that I was going to have to go out and pick something up for lunch and quickly thought about swinging by the grocery store instead of going to a restaurant.  And then it hit me – I haven’t been to the grocery store in almost a week.

A week.

For most people this probably doesn’t seem like a big deal.  Lots of people (including my mom when I was a kid) go to the grocery store once a week, or less.  But for me?  This is huge.

You see, when the kids are home, I feel like I spend most of my time at the grocery store, planning to go to the grocery store, or telling my husband that he needs to go to the grocery store.  Between the girls’ fickle eating habits and innate ability to make an entire carton of juice boxes disappear, we always need something.  I feel like each day I find myself saying to one of them, “Okay honey, I’ll get it for you the next time at the store”, despite the fact that I just left the grocery store a few hours before.  Only to have them fight me when I do prepare meals for them.  I’m convinced Greenleigh eats pretty much nothing and Hazeline gets picker by the day.

I have no idea where the food I’m buying is actually going.

But I know that I’m at the grocery store all. the. time.  I actually enjoy going to the grocery store.  I have a preferred grocery store where  the cashier’s know me and I see some of the same people on a weekly basis.  Hell, I’m at the grocery store so much that I’ve made how much I can save a sport.

And then I thought back to before I became a mom, you know, when a gallon of milk lasted the entire 2 weeks in the fridge, or until it expired and I had to throw it out.  I vaguely remember that back then the grocery store was a place that I went occasionally.  I didn’t have a particular store or know anyone there or create any games.  I picked things up when I needed them and an entire cart of groceries really would last for a week or more.  It almost seems strange to think about now.

I guess this is just a glimpse back to my former life.  I’ll just have to reintroduce myself to the cashiers when the girls return.