Tuna's on Sale
my father is a thrifty man. when i was a child he operated an underground stock-up mission that targeted every major grocer in town. he was ruthless in his desire for "more for the price of fewer". we had a food pantry in my house that could have kept us alive until the christ child once again walks the earth. i blame this partly on my dad's desire to offer as much to his children as possible. i blame it mostly on being raised to prepare for the next depression. whatever the reason for his hoarding, it had a strong impact on my life and unfortunately, the lives of my friends.
a sunny saturday morning i would rise from my dreamy slumber and stumble out to the kitchen where my dad would have 14 different boxes of cereal for me to choose from. if i appeared to be having difficulty choosing just one, my father would begin to sing the names of the cereals to me. he did this because he is a sweet and playful man. he did this also because it never failed to amuse him that i often woke up grumpy. he enjoyed aggravating me until i was about to implode and just when the annoyance was too much and i lashed out at him with my potentially vicious tongue, he would recoil and look very sad. "i am just trying to help! golly, you sure are grouchy!" i felt bad every time this happened. i knew that i shouldn't be grumpy, but my mind insisted that he should also know not to ack like a jackass all the time! i am 30 now and he is still a silly weirdo who makes up songs. he still thinks i am the mean one. by now i think i agree with him.
so he would be done singing and i would be half-way through the green clovers when the announcement would come. i would look up at him and glare at the colorful ad flier in his hands. the words that i had come to hate more than almost any others sprung from his lips with such glee: "tuna's on sale! 3 for a dollar! limit three." the 'limit three' part was a code. a message just for me. loosely translated from bargain speak to colloquial english, it meant: call sara and kristi a
nd whomever else you were going to play with today. i think my dad wanted kids largely so he could get more cheap stuff. he must have moved to south 22nd street because he heard that there were at least 10 other little girls approximately my age who could be coersed into trips to piggly wiggly. his plot was successful. very few of those girls missed out on the opportunity to help my father subvert the limit system at piggly wiggly. why on god's green earth anyone who did not rely on this man for food and shelter would ha
ve ever agreed to this job was and continues to be a mystery to me. sara did it most frequently. due in part to her ever-presence, but also, i think she secretly really enjoyed it. i did not.
so dad, shelly and sara all piled in to the blue bonneville to head to piggly wiggly for tuna. often he would convince us to take the trip with him by saying things like, "there's a candy bar in it for anyone who comes along!" and this was true. there was a candy bar. for me and sara and (fill in the blank). we always got candy bars, each of which must have cost at least as much as each can of tuna. even as a child i tried to do the math. it did not seem to be a cost-effective bargaining chip for him, but he never seemed to mind. i guess as long as he was getting more tuna for his money, everything else was detail.
once inside piggly wiggly, my anxiety level would start to climb. i think that i perceived "limit two" as some kind of city ordinance and i was under the overwhelmingly dreadful impression that if we were discovered in our undermining stunt we would be arrested and read our rights on the spot. i was like 8, i just knew that my dad said to "Shhh" about the whole situation. what did i know about limits at the grocery store?
we would get to the tuna aisle and dad would hand each of us three cans of tuna. we would dig in our pockets to retrieve the single dollar bill that he had given each of us in the car. we didn't want to look suspicious! as a very shy and scared child, the next part was the worst of all. we would have to walk off in different directions and each choose our own check-out lane. i HATED this part. there i was. all alone at the check-out, apparently expected to project the image that i am just your average 8-year-old girl who decided to go shopping for some food today. but only for tuna. and only with one dollar. sometimes i would try to act surprised when the tuna discount was revealed by the check-out person. as if i just happened to have a hunger on for tuna and it was my coincidentally lucky day that the craving came on this particular day of tuna specials! i remember so clearly standing in line, waiting my turn and trying not to look at sara. i can't give them any indication that we are involved in a tuna conspiracy. the three villains would meet back in the parking lot, three dollars lighter and 9 cans of tuna heavier. i don't even like tuna. if i were going to take a random shopping trip of my own volition, i certainly wouldn't be buying tuna. but this was not about my personal choice and motivation. this was my father's game and i was but a pawn in it. back into the bonneville we would climb so dad could drive us to the next piggly wiggly.
over the years i have grown to hate tuna more and more. and i have grown to find a great deal of humor in the weird things my dad made us do when we were young. my mom thinks it is the most hilarious thing she has ever heard when sara and i get together and talk about tuna. my mother recently admitted to me that she felt a little bad for us when we would have to go to the grocery store with dad. then where were you? but i suspect that she is just very glad he never asked her to do it. i asked my dad one time why it always seemed that sara and i had to go shopping with him. why didn't mike and sean have to go? "mike wouldn't do it" comes the flat response. this was optional? i could have refused? perhaps some day i will discover that i learned something important from this.
a sunny saturday morning i would rise from my dreamy slumber and stumble out to the kitchen where my dad would have 14 different boxes of cereal for me to choose from. if i appeared to be having difficulty choosing just one, my father would begin to sing the names of the cereals to me. he did this because he is a sweet and playful man. he did this also because it never failed to amuse him that i often woke up grumpy. he enjoyed aggravating me until i was about to implode and just when the annoyance was too much and i lashed out at him with my potentially vicious tongue, he would recoil and look very sad. "i am just trying to help! golly, you sure are grouchy!" i felt bad every time this happened. i knew that i shouldn't be grumpy, but my mind insisted that he should also know not to ack like a jackass all the time! i am 30 now and he is still a silly weirdo who makes up songs. he still thinks i am the mean one. by now i think i agree with him.
so he would be done singing and i would be half-way through the green clovers when the announcement would come. i would look up at him and glare at the colorful ad flier in his hands. the words that i had come to hate more than almost any others sprung from his lips with such glee: "tuna's on sale! 3 for a dollar! limit three." the 'limit three' part was a code. a message just for me. loosely translated from bargain speak to colloquial english, it meant: call sara and kristi a
nd whomever else you were going to play with today. i think my dad wanted kids largely so he could get more cheap stuff. he must have moved to south 22nd street because he heard that there were at least 10 other little girls approximately my age who could be coersed into trips to piggly wiggly. his plot was successful. very few of those girls missed out on the opportunity to help my father subvert the limit system at piggly wiggly. why on god's green earth anyone who did not rely on this man for food and shelter would ha
ve ever agreed to this job was and continues to be a mystery to me. sara did it most frequently. due in part to her ever-presence, but also, i think she secretly really enjoyed it. i did not.so dad, shelly and sara all piled in to the blue bonneville to head to piggly wiggly for tuna. often he would convince us to take the trip with him by saying things like, "there's a candy bar in it for anyone who comes along!" and this was true. there was a candy bar. for me and sara and (fill in the blank). we always got candy bars, each of which must have cost at least as much as each can of tuna. even as a child i tried to do the math. it did not seem to be a cost-effective bargaining chip for him, but he never seemed to mind. i guess as long as he was getting more tuna for his money, everything else was detail.
once inside piggly wiggly, my anxiety level would start to climb. i think that i perceived "limit two" as some kind of city ordinance and i was under the overwhelmingly dreadful impression that if we were discovered in our undermining stunt we would be arrested and read our rights on the spot. i was like 8, i just knew that my dad said to "Shhh" about the whole situation. what did i know about limits at the grocery store?
we would get to the tuna aisle and dad would hand each of us three cans of tuna. we would dig in our pockets to retrieve the single dollar bill that he had given each of us in the car. we didn't want to look suspicious! as a very shy and scared child, the next part was the worst of all. we would have to walk off in different directions and each choose our own check-out lane. i HATED this part. there i was. all alone at the check-out, apparently expected to project the image that i am just your average 8-year-old girl who decided to go shopping for some food today. but only for tuna. and only with one dollar. sometimes i would try to act surprised when the tuna discount was revealed by the check-out person. as if i just happened to have a hunger on for tuna and it was my coincidentally lucky day that the craving came on this particular day of tuna specials! i remember so clearly standing in line, waiting my turn and trying not to look at sara. i can't give them any indication that we are involved in a tuna conspiracy. the three villains would meet back in the parking lot, three dollars lighter and 9 cans of tuna heavier. i don't even like tuna. if i were going to take a random shopping trip of my own volition, i certainly wouldn't be buying tuna. but this was not about my personal choice and motivation. this was my father's game and i was but a pawn in it. back into the bonneville we would climb so dad could drive us to the next piggly wiggly.
over the years i have grown to hate tuna more and more. and i have grown to find a great deal of humor in the weird things my dad made us do when we were young. my mom thinks it is the most hilarious thing she has ever heard when sara and i get together and talk about tuna. my mother recently admitted to me that she felt a little bad for us when we would have to go to the grocery store with dad. then where were you? but i suspect that she is just very glad he never asked her to do it. i asked my dad one time why it always seemed that sara and i had to go shopping with him. why didn't mike and sean have to go? "mike wouldn't do it" comes the flat response. this was optional? i could have refused? perhaps some day i will discover that i learned something important from this.
posted by shelly at 11/21/2005 02:53:00 PM
2 Comments:
I laughed outloud. I love it. I never had the anxiety. I loved the trips to the store. I always thought your dad was so funny and silly. He was the only person I let call me "Baby Sara" even into my teens.
he still calls you baby sara.
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