The Aisle Not Taken

I ran into a friend yesterday that I hadn't seen in a couple of years. We were very close in high school. We used to have the best time together.

But yesterday, here I was in the grocery store after picking Maddie up from school. Parker had just woken from a nap and I had carried him, shoeless, out to the car. Maddie was looking particularly haggard due to PE and I had just finished mowing the lawn (hadn't changed, blades of grass still stuck to my feet). Isn't this always when you run into someone you haven't seen in a while?

Anyway, she is living this very cool, nomadic sort of life - flying off to find jobs around the world, wherever the mood strikes. She had just returned from one such jaunt and was planning on leaving again in a week or so.

I looked at my cart full of children, fruit snacks, juice boxes and milk and wondered about the paths we all take in life and how two people who had really been close could end up in such unrelatable places. I was a touch jealous at the footloose nature of her life, but Maddie was stroking my fingers as we spoke. It was all good.

We said our goodbyes, with the obligatory we'll-talk-soons and headed off again in our truly different directions.

But before we left the store, I wheeled my sweaty self and grubby kids over to one of the ethnic food sections to buy something for dinner...