Angel Man

I suppose I’ve paid a ga-zillion visits to various grocery store parking lots in my lifetime, and many times, like today, I exited the store with an overflowing cart FULL of groceries. (I hate to think of all the money I’ve spent on food over the years.) But this afternoon was different. I had a FIRST TIME EVER experience.

Oblivious to all the other shoppers (just as oblivious as they were to me - I mean who ever notices people in the parking lot?), I’d stashed all but the last two sacks of my mega-haul in the back of the mini-van. Suddenly I was aware of a rather homely-looking, elderly man who approached and stood near me.

I did a little internal double take as he continued to just STAND THERE. What did he want? Was he selling something, handing out advertisement flyers, or giving speeches one-on-one about the atrocities of war, abortion, the state of the economy, or world politics? Was he planning to grab a bag of my groceries and run? I tried to ignore him.

Eventually I could no longer pretend. So I spoke, just to be the first one to make a move, while intentionally seeming preoccupied with adjusting my bags: “Would you like my grocery cart?” I hoped he had just gotten out of his car and was planning to take mine with him – a way to relieve the cart-retrievers of having to push it back into the store.

“I can help you out,” he said.

That sounded pretty nebulous, so I still refused eye contact. After putting the last two bags in the car, I slammed the hatch rather quickly and started to walk to the driver’s door – still avoiding eye contact. “Thank you,” I said, out of politeness but not real thanks.

“I’ve already done my shopping – but I’m not in any hurry,” he replied. Out of the corner of my eye I could see he held a single shopping bag holding perhaps one small single item.

Then IT happened. He took my cart and pushed it over to the storage rack probably 4 or 5 cars away, back in the direction of the store, then turned and walked back the other way, past my car, to his car. He’d taken care of my cart purely as an act of kindness.

Of course I felt an instant pang of guilt. I didn’t even give this guy the pleasure of a smile of gratitude. And yet he was the first and only stranger in the mass of humanity swarming around – the first caring person EVER in a grocery parking lot – to notice I had a big load of stuff to handle and decided to make a kind overture just because it was a nice thing to do.

Even late this evening I keep thinking about him – who he was, why he did this, if it is something he does often or if it was a fluke one-time thing. He sure didn’t look like an angel to me, but in my mind that’s his name: Angel Man.