You wanted milk, so you walked to milk.
There had been no committee.
No one stopped in the cereal aisle to ask why cereal existed.
No one disappeared behind a display because they had discovered an object they needed to inspect from six angles.
No one announced that their leg hurt and then sprinted twenty feet toward free samples.
We reached the milk.
I put one carton in the cart.
Mission one complete.
“Can we get chocolate milk?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because we have milk.”
“That’s regular milk.”
“Yes.
The traditional kind.”
I moved toward the bread.
One child remained standing beside the refrigerator.
I stopped the cart.
“Come on.”
Nothing.
“Please.”
Nothing.
The child finally followed with the expression of someone whose constitutional rights had been suspended.
At the bread aisle, my phone rang again.
I should have ignored it.
I answered.
Instantly, both children began speaking.
Not loudly at first.
Just enough that I could not hear the call.
“Remember when—”
“Can we have—”
“Hold on,” I whispered.
The person on the phone said something.
“What?” I asked.
One child tugged my sleeve.
“I need to tell you something.”
“Not now.”
“It’s important.”
Everything was important when I was on the phone.
Ten minutes earlier, nobody had possessed a single thought worth sharing.
Now I was apparently surrounded by breaking news.
I ended the call early.
“What was so important?”
The child thought about it.
“I forgot.”
Of course.
I put bread in the cart.
Mission two complete.
Then came bananas.
The final objective.
We were within sight of them when one child stopped walking.
“I’m hungry.”
“We are literally buying food.”
“But I’m hungry now.”
“We’ll be home soon.”
“How soon?”
