Heartbreak

I knew heartbreak yesterday when, like many people, I was afflicted by shopping cart envy.

Oh, don’t deny that you haven’t experienced it in one form or another. You know what I’m talking about. Some of you have felt it when you’ve seen a cart filled with riches that you don’t have the money to buy. Others experience it when, like me, they look into another’s carts and see the stuff that you don’t eat because it’s not healthy for you, but you want to eat it.

I am a chronic sufferer of shopping cart envy these days. When I was younger, I could eat anything. Eating anything caught up with me as my activities and metabolism slowed and the speed of my waist line’s expansion increased. Ice cream, pizzas, burgers, milk shakes, sandwiches, steaks, cake, pie, doughnuts? Pass them over. Anyone want that last cruller? I’ll eat it.

Yes, I went through that period when I said, “I’m an adult. If I want to eat ice cream for breakfast, I will.”

Then I became, “I am an adult. What responsible adult eats ice cream for breakfast?”

Waistlines change. Diets change. Attitudes change. Yesterday, in Costco, I saw another man’s cart. He had a case of beer, cheesecake, a large pizza, and other treasures. I can’t describe more, as my mind went blank at the dazzling sight. I think I wandered, for the next thing I know, I was standing in a pool of my own saliva in the bakery section with a box of cookies in my hands.

I wasn’t alone.