Jan. 4, 2011: The Lion in Wal-Mart

The decision to begin this blog was pretty easy. When I announced my plans to leave Arizona, - where I have lived for the past 12 years - to return to my native Mississippi and enroll again at classes at Mississippi State University, the idea that I should commit the experience to print seems natural enough. I’m a writer, after all.
But where to start?
There seemed to be any number of jumping off points as I considered this initial post.
For dramatic effect, I might start in my bunk at Florence West Prison in Arizona, where I read a letter from my editor informing me that I had been fired as the newspaper’s Metro Columnist and my future went black.
I could also start in the few lonely, desperate years immediately after my release from prison, time marked by a series of low-paying jobs that ranged from car wash attendant to bagel shop cashier to coffee shop barista to graveyard-shift janitor, jobs that kept me fed and sheltered and little more.
I could just as easily start about this time last year, when - no longer legally confined to Arizona – I began to consider the possibility of going back to school to finish that degree I never thought I’d need back in 1982, when I left college in my junior year to begin my newspaper career.
But it seems to me the best place to start is at Wal-Mart.
It is 6 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 4th as I pull into the parking lot of the Wal-Mart Supercenter on Highway 12 in Starkville, Miss.
There is an enormous throng of cars in the parking lot and while Starkville is a small town (population just under 22,000), the parking lot is crammed full on a Tuesday night. I’d be willing to bet more than 10 percent of the town’s population is here.
I think this reveals a little about the nature of the people here.
I remember that when I left Mississippi in 1996 for a newspaper job in Northern California, one of the big local stories there was the protest of plans to build a Wal-Mart there. The opposition was bitter and effective. Wal-Mart eventually gave up plans for the store.
I doubt anybody protested when they built the Wal-Mart in Starkville, though. The parking lot attests to its popularity. In fact, I strongly suspect that if I were to have confronted one of the shopper I encountered Tuesday night and explained to them the evils of Wal-Mart, how the company drives small locally-owned businesses into oblivion and keeps costs down by all sorts of dirty tricks played on its employees, that customer would have listened patiently, perhaps nodding occasionally in agreement and then said, in a polite drawl, “Yeah, but you can get a big box of Gain Detergent for $4.97.’’
And that would be the end of that.
It’s about money. Folks here don’t make much of it. And they aren’t inclined to spend any more of it than is absolutely required. Let Californians worry about the moral implications of Big Box store. You just can’t turn away from a chance to save two dollars on a box of Gain detergent.
I wasn’t at Wal-Mart because of the deal on detergent, though. I was there to complete my final task before starting classes the next morning. My list had two items: Sharpie high-lighters and spiral notebook – five notebooks, one for each of my subjects.
I probably should have not made this my last task. When I arrived at the school supplies section, there was a large herd of college kids picking over the merchandise like a pride of lions snarling over the last morsels from the carcass of a wildebeest.
When I got to where the last notebooks were located - I judged that there were fewer than 20 of them remaining – I found a group of eight or nine kids jostling for possession.
Now, I am not proud of what I did at this point. But I needed notebooks. I managed to crowd just close enough to casually wonder aloud: “Hey, why are these notebooks $1,27 when the same notebooks in that big bin in the front of the store are marked 87 cents?’’
I said it just loud enough to be heard and, to my shame and satisfaction, the pack of notebook jackals dropped their prey and scurried toward the front of the score. Alone with the dwindling supply of notebooks, I was able to pick out the five I needed. I was even able to get notebooks with five different colored covers, which would be of some organizational value, I figured.
From a moral point of view, it was not my finest hour, I realize. But if an old lion is going to eat, he has to be resourceful. This is Wal-Mart on the eve of the first day of classes. It’s a jungle out there.
So I’m all set for classes. My first class is Intro to World Geography and I think that’s a good place to start. I mean, it’s not like World Geography has changed any since the last time I sat in a classroom. I’m old, all right, but I’m not that old. So I’m going back to school in the same geological epic, so I don’t figure the long lay-off will be much of a detriment. There shouldn’t be any new material to cover, you know?
Earlier Tuesday, I did my reconnaissance, locating the ideal parking lot and finding the buildings where I’ll be attending classes and charting the best routes from one class to the next. I stopped by the massive cafeteria, which looks more like a cathedral than a dining hall and is one of the many buildings that, like me, have some years on them.
I also stopped by the office of The Reflector, the student newspaper. I don’t know why, really. I just seemed to be drawn there.
The only people in the Reflector office were the advertising director and Amy, the editor.
I talked to Amy a little while, telling her I’d spent almost 30 years in the newspaper business as a reporter, editor and columnist at papers in Mississippi, California and Arizona. To be honest, I wanted her to be impressed.
It did not have the desired effect.
“Well, we have all the editors we need,’’ she said politely. “We might need some reporters, though. We won’t know until classes start and we start publishing again who is coming back. You fill out an application.
You’re probably better than half of the people we have on staff.’’
“Gee, do you really think so?’’ I asked.
“Yeah, probably,’ she said.
Amy told me reporters are paid anywhere from $8 to $20 per story, depending on quality.
I don’t think I’ll resume my newspaper job at The Reflector. I can’t afford it, quite frankly.
So I am all ready for school. I even have the clothes I’m going to wear set out. Apparently, dorkiness has a very long shelf life, huh?
Suddenly, I feel very old and very silly.
I’m ready, I reckon.