Maybe I hide this from you, the reader; maybe from myself.

 I don't like to talk it about it much. It's something I do that's private;
my grocery shopping. 

On nights like tonight. Late. After a long day, when my  drifting mind can't  focus on any one thing;  can't be distracted. Usually after 11:00pm in the middle of the week (tonight it happens to be Tuesday). The store is mostly empty by then. I can hear the piped in music. I know the words to the songs - all of them. I'm not lonely. And while I am alone, I am not the only one there. The other midnight solo shoppers, they know the words too. I see them singing. I'm sure they see me. 

I always have a list. Only a few items, nothing that should take the the hour or so I spend. I don't miss an isle. I wander through the bakery and and produce sections. I look at the Kosher products all wrapped up and sterile. I read the labels on the exotic squash and organic veggies.  With the interest of a newborn, I look at products I've never seen before - and things I use daily .  Lingering in the foreign foods section in my mind I concoct meals I'll never cook. I imagine conversations about what's good and if it's really worth the trouble. And sometimes I stop singing long enough to answer these questions myself. 

And I pick nights like tonight when the world seems quiet and I don't feel any pressure for time. I can set my own pace, I'm not in a hurry. I have nowhere to be. I breathe the slowness. I cherish this time. My drive to the store is quiet (sometimes with the windows down); classical music playing softly on the stereo and my mind drifts without any particular thoughts. Calm and void. 

In the parking lot I watch the other shoppers with a casual indifference, they are mere ghosts floating through this space. Fixtures in my dream state. Usually they make me smile. The young couple, tired from the days work, spending what little time they can together. Older men shuffling along faster than I'd care to and looking too tired to sleep. And the workout buffs, just in from the gym (no time for "real" shopping) still sweating and in a hurry to get home and do nothing. People with children don't usually come out this late. 

For me it's stress relief. It's legal distraction. Somehow it makes me feel kind. 

But it hasn't always been like this. 

I used to avoid shopping altogether. For quite some time now, my routine had been to dash in for an item here, an item there, but only when I was running from one place to another. I'd NEVER plan to go shopping. Not alone. And never this late. Years before I went shopping with John. I guess I never really realized how much that time together meant. Tonight it hit me. That's the kind of thing I miss. That....and holding hands.