The Gulag of Our Times

Last weekend I spent some time shopping at Walmart. Actually, I myself was not actually shopping, I was accompanying a friend. Even though it was around noon, I hadn't yet had my morning cup of coffee, so I decided to head to their little food area, ubiquitously placed to the right as one walks in. I looked around and saw that what they had that most matched my particular desires at that point was a cup of coffee and a toasted WonderBread bagel, with butter and jelly.

While the woman at the counter slowly prepared my bagel, she profferred me an empty cup. I looked around and failed to see any coffee percolating behind her, and after a while I noticed a coffee type contraption over where they offered condiments and plastic forks. "I guess you help yourself with the coffee, right?" I piped up and the counterwoman, without looking up at me, said yes.

I have to say that I am not very choosy about the kind of coffee I drink, but the watery brown liquid that entered my paper cup was pretty bad, although at least it was hot. I went back to the counter to pick up my bagel. Made by the Continental Baking Company, at least I could be sure that it was a wheat based product and it tasted as such. However, the slab of half melted yellowish goo was so unappetizing that even I dared not spread it on the bagel. And when I peeled off the top of the 'mixed fruit jelly' what was inside was a pale, gummy piece of something with a vague flavor of fruit that could have passed as chapstix just as well. I took a close look at the label and saw these words - 'Made especially for Walmarts.' I guess the jelly company needed an exuse for marketing such an unappealing product.

Seeing the pale jelly and drinking the watery coffee made me think of the Russian gulag - the place where so many people died under subhuman conditions being slave laborers. I recently saw a picture of a bunch of withered men with pickaxes slaving away at building a railroad. At least Walmarts didn't have swarms of mosquitos - but maybe at the jelly plant...

Anyway, then I met my friend in the pet department and looked at what she was purchasing, which included some sort of ersatz cat food. While the label looked a lot like Purina's label, I looked more closely at what was headlined to be Tuna for Cats. I found that it too was made 'especially for Walmarts.' Then I looked at the ingredients, which thanks to FDA rules made long ago are yet required on food items we buy. The first item, which is the greatest percentage of ingredient, on this can of fish for cats, was 'chicken byproducts.'

Now, my friend has two pretty little kittens, one of whom will end up at my house. I threw the cans of chicken beaks back onto the shelf and grabbed a case of Fancy Feast and went to pay.