com·mun·ion
noun
1.
the sharing or exchanging of intimate thoughts and feelings, especially when the exchange is on a mental or spiritual level.
2.
the service of Christian worship at which bread and wine are consecrated and shared.
The first trip Scott and I made to the grocery store after Hugh’s diagnosis of Type 1 Diabetes lasted two hours. We read every label on every item we thought we needed for Hugh. Where once we could breeze in and out of the grocery store in twenty minutes, now we carefully plan and scrutinize every purchase, making our trips last much longer. It’s just another thing that diabetes controls in our life. Another thing I didn’t think about before.
Our town is big enough to have more than one grocery store, but small enough that there is always someone I can chat with when I frequent mine. And since we Southerners love to cook and eat, our grocery stores become the places where we socialize, share recipes, and swap stories.
I make weekly trips to the store and can navigate the aisles with my eyes closed. I often direct people wandering the aisles to a specific item they are looking for. They should pay me, really, for all the time I have saved their staff in helping customers. I know when the fresh produce is put out (Monday mornings), when the best time of day for sushi is (11:00), and when to avoid the canned good aisle at all costs (whenever there is a 10 for $1 sale). I know to NEVER wear yard clothes or go sans make-up to the store, as that is always the time you run into your neighbor or your husband’s ex-girlfriend or your old boss. One time I ran into an acquaintance who is an exercise and healthy lifestyle enthusiast, and I threw the first healthy thing I saw into my cart just in case she was looking – broccoli and kale salad. I had a hard time explaining that one to Scott.
Our grocery store is also a place where we cannot hide the truth. Our carts speak for us. If you look under my broccoli and kale salad, you will see sugar free popsicles and no sugar added Nesquick. You will see a list of carefully planned out meals and juice boxes for lows and protein snacks. You will see someone desperately trying to control a disease that is never controllable. You will see me clawing my way into a reality that I still sometimes don’t want to admit is there.
I once stood in line behind a couple whose cart held one loaf of bread, a package of sliced cheese, three cans of pinto beans, two kool-aid packets, and a small jar of mayonnaise. I heard the woman tell the man, “This will have to do until our next paycheck. I hope it will last.”
Our carts don’t lie. There are carts with a bottle of wine and flowers. There are carts with food stamp approved items. There are carts with soft drinks and hot dogs and chips and cookies. There are carts with plenty. There are carts with nothing.
And there we all stand, in our neat little check-out rows, with all our items and all our lives out on display. There are days I fight the urge to turn to the woman next to me and say, “My son has Type 1 Diabetes. That’s why all this is in my cart. It’s really hard and some days I don’t know what I’m doing.”
I wonder what she would say to me. “My husband recently died from cancer. That’s why I don’t have much food in my cart. I just don’t eat as much now that he’s gone.”
Or “I just lost my job. I have to provide for my kids and I don’t know where it’s going to come from. All I can afford is in my cart”
Or “I’m getting off work early today. We are having a party for my daughter who graduated. She’s leaving for college soon and I’m really going to miss her. All that is in my cart is for her.”
As I was standing in line a few days before Easter, imagining what the tired mom beside me with two little boys would say if I asked what was in her cart, it hit me. This is our communion. This is our breaking of bread and sharing of wine. Right here in the grocery store check out line.
And I have to say, if Jesus were to come back tomorrow, I think he might pick a grocery store aisle to do it. As we are pushing our carts and our lives toward the frozen food section, we pass Jesus pushing his cart toward the ice cream. And he doesn’t even have to look in our carts to know who we are and what we are struggling with. He just smiles with eyes that already know our souls and he says, “Try the Rocky Road. It’s my favorite.”
In our lives where we tend to not notice others, where we rush in and out of grocery stores and each others lives like our very life depends on saving 5 minutes of time, let us slow down and practice communion whenever we get the chance. Let us notice the ones standing in line before us and behind us. Let us be kind. Let us love. Let us allow the mom with a crying toddler some grace. Let us have patience with the loud teenager. Let us smile at the check-out clerk and the one who bags our groceries.
Let us break the bread and share the wine with not just the ones we choose, but the ones who are standing in line with us. The ones who look different than us. The ones who are happy. The ones who are sad. The ones with plenty in their carts and the ones with nothing.
After all, we don’t know their struggles, but we can see what’s in their cart.
