Aldi, Jack Sparrow & Choices

I don’t think it’s possible to be within a mile of an Aldi without popping in for a few things. At least it’s not for my mom, who adores shopping, unlike me who once bought a television double parked outside of a Sears.

After running some errands, we’d stopped at Red Robin for a burger in the sprawling outdoor mall known as the Waterfront. Despite gentrification efforts, including this homage to consumerism, Homestead is still an economically depressed area, filled with descendants of steel mill workers and ancillary industries long gone from the Pittsburgh landscape.

The Aldi is located right outside the mall and I’ve always enjoyed observing the parade of real Pittsburghers — well coiffed, scruffy, short, tall, seniors, teens, moms with toddlers — that shuffled in and out of the store as I sat in the car while my mom shopped. This day was no different. And yet it was.

The rain slid in sheets down the windshield as I listened to Heart sing “What About Love?” and watched as the unprepared dug in pockets and purses for quarters near the line of shopping carts off to the left. (For those of you not indoctrinated to the Aldi way of life, you rent a cart for a quarter and then get it back when you return the cart. This ostensibly saves shoppers money because of less theft and it being unnecessary for an employee to collect them from the parking lot).

The procession on this damp Saturday did not disappoint. No matter their age or economic background, the rain leveled the playing field making everyone’s goal the same — to stay dry. As I sat safely in the car, my eyes were drawn to a skinny young man, dressed in jeans and a bright green t-shirt that was almost covered by a gray hooded sweatshirt that boldly proclaimed “2016 Champions.”

He stood at the automatic doors and approached everyone who came out of the store pushing a cart. After a brief conversation, he trotted behind the shopper only to return a few moments later returning the empty cart back to the entrance where he shoved it into line and pocketed the quarter.

While he waited for his next mark, he twitched with the unmistakable behavior of an addict. He scratched his face, rubbed his nose, pulled up his pants, ran his hand through his beard, all while bouncing around the line of empty carts to music only he could hear. It was like a dance, cycle after cycle. Until someone else with a cart full of groceries came through the exit.

He sailed by my car a dozen times, riding the empty cart in the rain like Captain Jack Sparrow, his sneakers planted on the metal bar beneath the handle. In this moment, he looked happy. I cynically wondered if the elation was because of the bump he hoped to earn from his impromptu job.

After a while, I noticed my thoughts while people reacted to his plea. Some appeared frightened. Others, impervious to the request, ignored him and kept walking. Then there were those who invited him along, and I watched in the rear-view mirror as he helped load their groceries into a car.

My judgment was loud.

He shouldn’t be bothering those poor people!

Maybe I should go inside and tell the manager.

He needs to get some help.

He’s scaring the older folks.

What if he hurts someone?

He better not come anywhere near my mother.

As I wrestled my thoughts, an older man who’d earlier refused Jack Sparrow’s help approached the entrance. He hurried in the rain to return his cart to the stack but stopped just short. He looked at Jack, smiled and pushed the cart gently in his direction, offering him the quarter.

I felt like the Grinch.

The armor of judgment I’d forged around my heart cracked and I saw the reality. A young man, who for whatever reasons — none of them healthy or loving or nurturing — was addicted to meth or some other drug, and instead of committing a crime to sate his need, chose to offer some small part of himself to others who might find value in it. This was how he got what he needed.

It was painful. Because in that light, I saw the distasteful ways I’ve gotten what I told myself I needed. Like all the times I sat silent in the midst of the misogyny at work for fear I’d be reprimanded if I spoke up. Or how I capitulated repeatedly to a business partner’s demands because I told myself I wouldn’t survive if I left. And the grandaddy of fear-driven choices, staying with an abusive ex off and on for twenty years because I convinced myself he was the only one who’d love me.

I betrayed myself through choices that appeared to be logical when they were merely protected me from a bogey man I’d created with my imagination. Judging him protected me from clearly seeing the reality in my own decisions.

My mom exited the store, and he approached her. I watched her confusion as the rain poured down and he made his pitch. I rolled down the window. “Thanks,” I said. “We’ve got this.”

“I’m sorry,” he replied, twitching and scratching. “I don’t mean no harm.” He walked away and I helped my mother get the groceries into the car. Then we watched Jack offer his services to someone else as we drove off, and I was left to decide whether to continue judging him or to look in the mirror. Choices.

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