This Song is Terrible

One morning, I was in the grocery store just after eight a.m. It was, as usual, packed, and despite my best attempts, I did not find a time to visit that did not involve apparently everyone else.

But, I was moving through the store fairly efficiently. I had nearly everything on my list but Greek yogurt, and I made my way to the far end of the store where the yogurt is kept.

When I got there, an employee, a guy who looked to be in his sixties, was in the refrigerated case next to the yogurt, restocking. A woman with a packed cart was next to him, blocking my access to the Greek yogurt section.

The woman moved as if she were underwater. I watched her dreamily read the labels on each yogurt container, and the longer I waited, the less sure I was that this seemingly suburban, housewife-looking woman was in fact sober. She did not seem to notice I was waiting.

But, I am a completely chill person, so I just stood there and did not politely ask to reach around her. The longer I waited, the louder the music seemed to become. In fact, the music, a man child singing about unrequited love, monopolized my senses. All I could hear was his whiney, whiney voice. And, without intending to, I looked at the guy doing the restocking and said, "This song is terrible."

The guy looked at me but didn't speak. I immediately felt that dread that goes along with that unfortunate tick I have of sometimes talking to random people about whatever is happening around us, and them just staring at me like I am crazy. And, since I was on the apparent waiting list to move into the yogurt section, I now had to choose to either abandon the mission or just stand next to this man like I hadn't just had a spontaneous utterance straight at him about the music. He probably loved this song.

And while my brain was doing all this, the guy just kept looking at me. Then, without any sense of timing, he yelled, "THE MUSIC THEY'VE BEEN PLAYING HERE FOR THE LAST FIVE YEARS IS TERRIBLE."

Had I found a kindred spirit?

I laughed, but politely, and not at all like a crazy person.

"I'm serious. This song is awful. But there is one song they play every night at midnight." The man shook his head. "I swear. It ends with this hum. A HUM. And it's enough to make you want to howl. FIVE YEARS OF THIS CRAP."

I laughed louder. The woman making bedroom eyes at the yogurt finally noticed my existence. I continued to laugh.

"It is terrible," the guy said.

And the woman, beaming into Earth for the first time since I'd been there, shuffled her cart just enough that I could get my yogurt.

So I grabbed it, and made my way toward the check out station.

I laughed my entire way there.

The music sucked. He knew it. I knew it.

That was enough.