Frozen Peas and Indignation

This morning I decided to boycott the local supermarket.

I have arrived at this point after a catalogue of misdemeanours. I am a wheelchair user and I am utterly sick and tired of having to ask for assistance from sulky staff when it is a question of getting round the damn shop.


It's not a big thing in the scheme of things, I'm not homeless or widowed or alone or having to scavenge for food to feed my kids. I know I'm fortunate. I don't get down about my illness often, it's just that when little things keep happening they become systemic and lack of disabilty awareness in people around me eats into my energy and self-esteem. I am a lone angry person harbouring a grudge and really I wanted to make a big placard saying 'Heellooo!!' and maybe hit the manager over the head with it while chaining myself to the trolley park in protest. Instead I, naughtily and stroppily (not that anyone was an audience to my righteous anger), backed out of their one-way entry system as the entrance - yet again - was blocked by crates of fruit. I was in a bad mood already, probably due to the fact that chocolate should be free on the National Health System - but it's not (potential vote winning policy there...).
I can only get into 4 shops in my town - 2 are bars (there must be a god - make mine a double), one lovely stationery shop which last year installed a ramp and an automatic door and the afore-mentioned supermarket which offers a depressingly challenging experience at the best of times. As you root through produce checking the 'eat by' dates, scouring for signs of mould on cheese and meat and potential salmonella and botulism and as you keep your eyes peeled for open boxes where the contents have been taken in a cunning attempt to beat the alarm system (the funniest is when you can follow the trail of open cakes, open drinks and open crisps and realise that someone's eaten a meal there - brave souls!), you realise that these experiences make you question your own optimism. I realise that I'm always waiting for the supermarket to get better... in fact, I probably spend my life waiting for things to get better, meanwhile life and the 'eat by' dates in the supermarket are both expiring rapidly. So, I'm taking charge. I've given it plenty of chances to improve and now it's just one insult too far - I can't even get in the shop to suffer it. It's like being annoyed when you can't be tortured due to lack of diability awareness and the 'rack' isn't situated on a hydraulic bed to facilitate transferring.

'What if I WANNA be tortured??'

Anyway I have told the kids that if we can't buy it from the freezer shop (which luckily sells bread... and cake), then we aint eating it. I am empowering myself and taking the moral highground while simultaneously sucking on a frozen pea.

And it tastes good.