Snapshots

An upscale Piggly Wiggly--who would have thought?

This is life right now:

• We spent Sunday afternoon in Myrtle Beach, exploring, and we found two places we’d not been before. The first was a trashy flea market where we walked in the heat, melting, my long summer dress clinging to my legs, and looked at cheap guitars, gaudy turquoise rings, old cast iron skillets, pocketknives. A woman was selling used books for outrageous prices and as we drove away I complained (“You can’t sell a used paperback for five dollars. It just isn’t done!”) and Jesse remarked, “You sound personally offended,” and I paused and thought and said, “Why, yes, I believe I am.” Then we drove past the beaches and the beach hotels and ended up in a ritzy part of town, a new development it seemed, where we found, to our great amazement, a ritzy Piggly Wiggly. We immediately stopped the car and went in, and then spent probably a solid half hour wandering through the store, exclaiming things like, “A whole display just for imported Belgium beers?” and “Check out these cakes!” The Piggly Wiggly in our town sells beef tongue and smells funny. This Piggly Wiggly was the nicest grocery store we’d ever been in. We bought Little Debbie snacks and milk and ate in the parking lot.

It wasn't an illusion--the inside was as nice as the outside!

• We spent that evening in a mall, talking about New York. It seems that the jobs I am both qualified for and interested in are all in New York. The fact that we’re discussing this both excites and terrifies me.

• In the event we do not move to New York, and honestly we probably won’t, I am exploring my employment options in North Carolina. They are few and far between. I’m applying for everything right now, including jobs high schoolers apply for, and this has been more of a hit to my ego than I expected. I’m three years away from thirty and have a master’s degree. I started to apply for jobs at Harris Teeter, but I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t do it. I know this blog might prompt worried emails from family members, but I’m sorry, if you can job hunt in the middle of a recession in a city that didn’t have good jobs even before the recession, if you can do that without getting a little bit depressed, then I’m worried about you.

• Saturday was by far the worst—the day I almost applied for the Harris Teeter job, the day I got the most discouraged about my employment prospects, the day before we started talking about New York. That evening, I read a blog Sabrina posted about fried rice with SPAM and I knew instantly that SPAM was the only thing that would brighten my mood, so I dropped everything and ran to Wal-Mart (you can buy SPAM at Harris Teeter, but why would you?). It’s been years since I’ve had SPAM, and I wondered if I’d be able to find it, but as I looked at the signs over the aisles I realized I needn’t worry: Wal-Mart has an aisle specifically marked “Canned Meat.” In said Canned Meat aisle, I saw a row of familiar plastic pouches and thought, “Oh, what the heck,” and grabbed two packs of Ramen noodles. Might as well. And? Turns out I was right. SPAM helped.

• I am starting a new book and I’m pretty sure it’s about zombies.

• Yesterday, Jesse came home from work early and on the way home stopped at the grocery store to rent a movie. I had watched both A. and M. that morning and was exhausted. I didn’t mean to, but I had fallen asleep on the couch, and Jesse came in and woke me up with a kiss and a rose he’d gotten for me. I love that man.