ROBIN WRITES: Meat in a can
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John was in the mood for a favorite food. He strode into the local supermarket chain and stopped cold.
Where would it be? It had been a few years since he’d eaten it, and I’m sure I’d been the one to buy it the last time he asked for it.
John began his search. It wouldn’t be on the fresh food aisle—far from it. This was preserved food. The kind you found in cans. The kind you could keep on your shelf as long as life was long. As long as it didn’t bulge, that can was good.
The inner aisles held the cans. He made a left onto the row and passed thousands of canned fruits and vegetables. John turned up the next aisle. And the next. Soon, he had traveled to the boxed food row. Too far.
It was time to get help. He hated to get help… he’d avoided directions since he’d been old enough to need them. But he was tired and hungry. And he wanted his favorite food.
A bespeckled boy was pulling boxes of macaroni and cheese from the back of the shelf to the front. His back was stooped in the effort; his arms were elbow-deep in his task.
“Hi. Can you help me find something?”
The stocker retracted his arms and stood tall. “Yep. What are ya looking for?”
“Potted Meat.” John blurted his request like the punch line of a joke and waited for an aisle number.
His question smacked the boy in the face, making his eyes jitter like slot machine lemons. Potted?
“Uh. I’m not sure…” He grew silent and stared at his sneaker laces for a few seconds.
After a few awkward moments, John pitched in some helpful clues:
“It’d be near the Vienna sausages and—you know—those little fish cans you used wind to open with a metal key. That was always fun!”
The word ‘sardines’ swam away from his brain temporarily, but he’d remember it once he got in his truck.
By now, the stocker had begun to panic. These kinds of foods were not ones he’d grown up with. The foods John was describing sounded like army rations or survivalist supplies.
The boy was beginning to pity John; this poor old man was looking for meat in cans. Did he not have the means to cook or store real food? He glanced into John’s empty cart for tins of cat food. Should he alert an agency?
“Well,” he mumbled. “Let’s look up ‘canned meats’ on my app.”
After a few digit punches and pauses to scroll, relief flooded the stocker’s face.
A square, blue, rectangular can popped into view on his phone. SPAM! Meat in a can! He’d seen a can of it on his grandma’s shelf, years ago, when he was 6 or 7. That must be near the food THIS grandpa was looking for.
He announced his findings like a prospector whose mining pan had yielded gold.
“AISLE 5!” Meat in a can is on AISLE 5!” Relief straightened his spine and forced a wan smile from the boy’s lips.
The old man would not starve. There was canned meat in this store for him. He could stack up his cans like Jenga blocks; unwind fish containers with metal keys, punch a pocket-knife along the edges of can rims, and subsist on food whose shelf life probably surpassed his own.
The stocker was happy and was sure to share this story with his friends at McDonald’s later.
John thanked the young man, did a three-point turn, mid-aisle, and rolled toward his potted meat.
Maybe he’d grab a couple of those fish in a can, too.
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■ Robin is a freelance columnist who lives and writes in Quincy, Illinois. Contact her at [email protected].
