Community Care Creative

For many, the second someone enters a store they are no longer a person. They are now a customer. And the level of entitlement that comes with being a customer knows no bounds. I, as a customer or employee, get reached over, pushed past, parked in front of, etc. It’s like no other people exist once a person becomes a customer. Just 10 minutes ago a couple quite literally pushed me out of the way to grab a bag of tortillas. They said, ‘excuse me,’ once I’d remarked, ‘hey now!’

But this is the norm. Thanks to my job, which is no longer retail but is retail adjacent, I’m at an average of 3 grocery stores per day, 5 days a week. I get this treatment in rich neighborhoods more than lower income neighborhoods, for sure. The two rich neighborhoods I visit for work, I brace myself before entering a store.

I once had to elbow a woman off of me during the holidays when she tried to physically move me. I deflect cellphones stuck within inches of my face. I get one word demands for products almost daily (‘pasta.’ What? Is this really how adults treat other adults?’

I help customers who treat me like a human, when they treat me poorly I state the fact, ‘I don’t work here.’ Then they’ll frequently tell me why they thought I worked there, as though it’s my fault that they have no idea that all the employees wear uniforms.

‘Well, your keys make you look like you work here.’ They’re my car keys, I was in a middle school a few miles from Columbine when IT happened. I make sure I can safely get away from any unsafe situation.

‘Your blazer makes you look official.’ It’s a jean jacket, my Jean jacket with a massive spider broach makes me look official.

‘You look like you know where you’re going.’ This one I find hilarious, the majority of people shop at the same grocery store every week and still lack any sort of awareness that would help them find the same items they buy every week. I worked grocery for over a decade, I say this from experience.

I had one guy YELL at me down an aisle while I was reading a package, I wasn’t even working. ‘Barbecue sauce!’ So I looked at him puzzled and said, ‘rice noodles!’ Then he paused and said more gently, ‘oh I thought you worked here.’ So I yelled loud enough for anyone around to hear, ‘that’s not an acceptable way to talk to someone who works here, either!’

I had a guy reach past me so closely he shoved my arm, so I told him he needs to say excuse me or wait his turn. He told me, ‘shut up, bitch.’ A woman was with him, I raised my eyebrows at her in hopes to communicate, ‘this is not acceptable behavior, please don’t accept this from him.’ And I told him I’m happy to take it outside and we can see who the bitch is. He tossed the protein bar back to the shelf and walked out.

I had another guy lean his body over mine as a crouched trying to get a bottle of kombucha. This man laid his chest over my back to reach over me. I shoved him off and said with some volume, ‘don’t touch strangers!’ And he was very smug when he told me, ‘stop being so dramatic, I didn’t touch you.’ Of course I kept hurling insults about him apparently touching women without their consent enough that he probably doesn’t even register it anymore.

I had a lady slam a cooler door into the back of my head because she didn’t want to take the two steps to get around me. I followed her to the parking lot and pointed out exactly what she did. As she tried to say, ‘you were in my way,’ I kept talking louder about assault and how she’s old enough to know that she shouldn’t make her bad day everyone else’s bad day.

My friends who don’t work retail wonder why I deal with hyper vigilance. I’m always on guard. And yeah, part of that is being trans, part is walking through the world perceived as a woman, part is growing up in the state leading the country in school shootings, part is my mother constantly telling me that I’ll be kidnapped. But the hyper vigilance set in post 2020 when the entitlement soared. When people suddenly decided personal space equated to the days of social distancing. I miss the days of 6 feet, but right now I’d settle for 2. In an almost completely empty store, people will still act like where I am is there only place in the store they want to be.

So, when you enter a store and become a customer, please remember to use full sentences, manners, and provide people their personal space. Start observing your own behavior and ask yourself if that’s really how you want to show up in the world.

I finally got mulch since temps are reaching mid 90s already. The snap peas are slowly producing, the red noodle beans are growing steadily, my kale babies and adults have decided to THRIVE, the spinach I seeded a few weeks ago bolted thanks to this heat, and my arugula, basil, and cilantro are plooping up. I decided to not thin the green onions in the planter and instead eat them as chives, since I’m impatient and greedy. The salad greens are coming at stages and I have some that will be lunch today! Every time I tie up the pea plants I have to make a comment about my Blair Witch ass backyard.

And my potato bag garden got their bags rolled the rest of the way up today and topped off with soil. No more rolling potato bags this season! Now I can stop annoying the sweet spiders who inhabit the bags and let them live their lives. I love using these grocery bags and the rice bag, it feels like I’m ensuring they fill up with taters.

And, of course, these hollyhocks are MASSIVE. I’ve come to terms that the dirt closest to the fence is too shaded and too damaged from our neighbors leaking, chemical ridden kiddie pool to grow anything but rogue hollyhocks don’t seem to mind that. We have a bunch of baby hollyhocks coming up despite the challenges, so I’ll leave them there and have a full fence line of flowers next year. I was super disappointed about it a few weeks ago, now I’m stoked about it.

Finally, my partner and I discussed the possibility of starting a Bokashi compost bin using our extra refillable cat litter buckets. I’ve tried different compost methods before and failed miserably with them, so I kept telling him to not let me try compost again. It’s too smelly and there’s too many bugs and I get too grossed out to keep them going. But I did weeks of research on Bokashi and feel like we can give it a try with very little start up involved. We already have a lot of litter buckets and the only purchase I’d need to make is the Bokashi grain stuff. I know I’ll need to fret about this for another week or so before committing.

I have been organizing community events for a long time. I have very low energy and spend a lot of time emotionally recuperating from having to self regulate and protect my brain. So I tend to organize my own things around my capabilities and my own needs, then offer that out to others who would also benefit from my limitations. So far I’ve done a ton of one-off events, I host a monthly stuff swap with my friends, and I host a monthly queer club for people who value masking and want to play board games at a local library. I’ve also done book swap events at a local park, communicated by paper flyers on lamp poles and Facebook local groups.

Relearning to knit has given me so much POWER.

My Grama taught me to knit through the back loop and trying to find patterns or tutorials on doing anything more than knit and purl has felt impossible. That hasn’t stopped me from knitting pot scrubbers, ear warmers, scarves, hand towels, face towels, and now a steering wheel cover.

Today I pulled out the last few radishes, since they were shading my little sprouts. And moved two potato sacks from the front to join their thriving potato buddies in the backyard area.

Getting up at 6am on my day off to crouch for an hour, pulling out the only weed I hate (the vining one that grows like 5 inches a day and suffocates my plants), talking to spider friends, sticking my hands in dirt, and then running from wasps promptly at 7:20am is what I look forward to all week. The backyard is very shaded, very small, and this is my experiment year, and I love everything about it.

First snap pea of the season. After months of helping these vines along and monitoring their progress, I’ve got a baby snap pea!

I keep making full sheets of what I’m thinking, printing them for free at the local library, cutting them into singles, and leaving them everywhere I go. Public restrooms? Yes. Grocery store shelves? Yes.