Let me begin by saying that I am calm.
I want that on the record, because I know how these things get characterized. A man writes a few hundred words about a grocery store and suddenly he’s “upset,” he’s “worked up,” his wife is asking whether he “needs to go sit in the car for a minute.” I do not need to go sit in the car. I am already in the car. I am writing this from the car.
Here is what happened. On Saturday I went to the grocery store where I have shopped every Saturday at 9:15 a.m. for 23 years, and someone had moved the cereal.
The cereal used to be in aisle 6. It is now in aisle 11. Aisle 6 now contains bread, which used to be in aisle 3. Aisle 3 now contains something called “Global Flavors,” which as far as I can tell is soy sauce and a jar of something I’m not prepared to discuss in a family newspaper.
I am not upset about this. Stores change. That is what stores do. I’m a reasonable man. I simply want to know WHO DECIDED THAT CEREAL GOES NEXT TO THE MOTOR OIL.
I apologize. That was a formatting error. I am calm.
I asked a young man in a vest for help. His name tag said “Brayden,” and under that it said “Happy to Help,” which I’ll note was not entirely accurate. I asked Brayden where the cereal was, and he said, and I’m quoting him directly, “It’s been moved.” I KNOW IT HAS BEEN MOVED, BRAYDEN. THAT IS THE ENTIRE PREMISE OF MY QUESTION.
Again, I want to be fair to Brayden, who did not move the cereal and who, I later learned, is 16. I’ve written him a letter. It’s a calm letter.
There’s a sign at the entrance now that says the store has been “reimagined to improve your shopping journey.” I do not want a journey. A journey is what you take when you have lost something. I want to walk to aisle 6 and get the cereal and go home, the way my father did, and his father before him, who did not have an aisle 6 but would have wanted one.
Let me explain something about aisle 6. I have maintained a map of this store in my head for TWENTY-THREE YEARS, and I did not consent to an update. Nobody asked me. Nobody sent a letter. I would have read the letter. I READ EVERYTHING THEY SEND. I READ THE CIRCULAR. I READ THE BACK OF THE RECEIPT, WHERE THEY ASK HOW MY VISIT WAS, AND I TELL THEM, AND THEY HAVE NEVER ONCE WRITTEN BACK.
Fine.
My wife says the new layout is “honestly kind of better.” I love my wife very much, and we are not discussing this.
I reached Dr. Chad Brickhouse of the Institute for Common Sense by phone, in what sounded like a bowling alley, and he told me that any reasonable person would expect the cereal to be where the cereal is. He has been very supportive. He said it was just common sense, and then he said “strike,” and I’m choosing to believe he was agreeing with me.
So here is my proposal, and I think you’ll find it modest. I am not asking for much. I am asking that every grocery store in the nation be returned to the way it was in 2003, and then frozen there, permanently, by law, with a plaque. That’s it. That is the whole ask. It’s a reasonable ask from a reasonable man who is sitting in his car.
In the meantime, I’ve found a workaround. I now arrive at 9:15 and walk the store in the correct order. Aisle 3 for bread. Aisle 6 for cereal. I don’t pick anything up, because none of it is there. But I walk it, the right way, and I nod at the Global Flavors, which is where the bread was, and I go home. It takes 40 minutes. The produce staff has started to watch me. I believe they are learning.
My blood pressure on Monday was 141 over 93. Last week it was 138 over 91. My doctor says this is “trending.” I want to be clear that it is trending calmly.