A while back, an old friend of mine was in Toledo on business. After her meetings, she swung by our house for dinner.
We were barely through the salad when she got right to it.
“What,” she asked Don, “is the deal with you people and Costco?”
“Thank you!” I said. “Seriously!”
Don looked perplexed. “What do you mean? Costco is wonderful.”
“That’s what I mean! Everyone here is obsessed!”
She went on to explain that every event, from the 8:00 am Stand Up to the 5pm Wrap Up had been punctuated by paeans to the superstore:
—Know where we got these muffins? Costco!
—Hey, guess who has an amazing sale on lawnmowers right now! You know it! Hehe.
—Can’t beat that Costco!
—You know I live *two blocks away*?!
—Wow! You ARE blessed.
I’d been putting up with this weirdness for close to two years at this point so was pleased to have someone so clearly articulate my misgivings. It’s not that I didn’t try to understand. I did. After all, when 9 out of 10 strangers you meet in a given day urge you to head over for a rotisserie chicken, some snow pants, and a 12-gallon vat of olive oil, you think, “There’s gotta be something to this, right? I should give it a try.”
But mostly I was overwhelmed. First there were the gas tanks, where approximately 3,000 vehicles were arranged at angles, like some hyperactive six-year-old’s Fisher Price parking lot.
“We’ll get through really quickly,” Don told me “It’s so efficient!”
He was right. The system seemed to have been designed by that lady who made slaughterhouses more inviting for the cattle. Before I knew it we were gassed up, parked, and headed in for *massive aisles* full of *massive things*. I thought about getting some crackers, but the only option was to buy 17 boxes of crackers, shrink-wrapped together on pallets. The freezer section was just an actual freezer that you had to walk into to buy your 20 gallons of ice cream or what-have-you. I was half-surprised the little motorized carts didn’t come with forklift attachments.
“Don,” I said when we were done. “I love you. But I think Costco is going to be your thing.”
“That’s fine,” he said grinning. “I love Costco!”
And that was our arrangement until this past week, when Sarah needed a new pair of glasses. I’d put up with my bottom-dollar, three-prescriptions-old, two-inch-thick lenses for a long while. But when the earpiece broke off and I had to reattach it with duct tape, well…I gave in.
“Don,” I said. “Take me to Costco.”
We were ushered into the optical section by Dan, a gentle Weird Al Yankovic look-alike with giant plastic purple frames. He talked soothingly about lens options and complimented my frame choice.
He also seemed, weirdly, to be a mind-reader. “How often are you wearing those dailies, now? More than a day? I thought so. You need to talk to your optometrist about that!” I felt scolded, but also, somehow, loved. We ordered, paid, and waited for them to arrive.
Yesterday, they arrived. A different, equally gentle, equally pleasant woman fitted the glasses to my face. “Now, I want you to walk around the store for a little while with these, OK?” she said. “You need some time to get used to them.”
I nodded meekly and began my perambulations. It was the strangest thing. The olive oil…I mean, it was still 12 gallons, but suddenly that seemed…reasonable? Did I need 100 pairs of underwear? I might. I shoved the glasses a little further up my nose. Really, I just might.
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