Supermarket

There happen to be whole, large parts of adult American life that nobody talks about in commencement speeches
One such part involves boredom
Routine
And petty frustration
The parents and older folks here will know all too well what I’m talking about

By way of example
Let’s say it’s an average adult day
And you get up in the morning
Go to your challenging, white-collar, college-graduate job
And you work hard for eight or ten hours
And at the end of the day you’re tired
And somewhat stressed
And all you want is to go home and have a good supper and maybe unwind for an hour, and then hit the sack early
Because, of course, you have to get up the next day and do it all again
But then you remember there’s no food at home

You haven’t had time to shop this week
Because of your challenging job
And so now after work you have to get in your car and drive to the supermarket
It’s the end of the workday
And the traffic is apt to be
Very bad
So getting to the store takes way longer than it should
And when you finally get there, the supermarket is very crowded
Because of course, it’s the time of day when all the other people with jobs also try to squeeze in some grocery shopping
And the store is hideously fluorescently lit
And infused with soul-killing muzak or corporate pop
And it’s pretty much the last place you want to be
But you can’t just get in and quickly out
You have to wander all over the huge, over-lit store’s confusing aisles to find the stuff you want
And you have to maneuver your junky cart through all these other tired, hurried people with carts

And eventually
You get all your supper supplies
Except now it turns out there aren’t enough check-out lanes open
Even though it’s the end-of-the-day rush
So the checkout line is incredibly long
Which is stupid and infuriating
Stupid and infuriating
Which is stupid and infuriating
Stupid and infuriating

But you can’t take your frustration out on the frantic lady working the register
Who is overworked at a job whose daily tedium and meaninglessness surpasses the imagination of any of us here at a prestigious college

But anyway, you finally get to the checkout line’s front
And you pay for your food
And you get told to
‘Have a nice day’
In a voice that is the absolute voice of death
Then you have to take your creepy, flimsy, plastic bags of groceries in your cart with the one crazy wheel that pulls maddeningly to the left
All the way out through the crowded, bumpy, littery parking lot
And then you have to drive all the way home through slow, heavy, SUV-intensive, rush-hour traffic, et cetera et cetera

Everyone here has done this, of course
But it hasn’t yet been part of you graduates’ actual life routine

[Chorus]
Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
D-D-Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
D-D-Day after week, after month, after year
D-D-Day after week, after month, after year

But it will be
And many more dreary, annoying, seemingly meaningless routines besides
But that is not the point
The point is that petty, frustrating crap like this is exactly where the work of choosing
Is gonna come in
Because the traffic jams and crowded aisles and long checkout lines give me time to think
And if I don’t make a conscious decision about how to think and what to pay attention to
I’m gonna be pissed and miserable every time I have to shop
Because my natural default setting is the certainty that situations like this are really all about me About MY hungriness and MY fatigue and MY desire to just get home
And it’s going to seem for all the world like everybody else is just in my way

And who are all these people in my way?
And look at how repulsive most of them are, and how stupid and cow-like and dead-eyed
And nonhuman they seem in the checkout line
Or at how annoying and rude it is that people are talking loudly on cell phones in the middle of the line
And look at how deeply and personally unfair this is

Or, of course, if I’m in a more socially conscious liberal arts form of my default setting
I can spend time in the end-of-the-day traffic being disgusted about all the huge stupid
Lane-blocking SUV’s and Hummers
And V-12 pickup trucks
Burning their wasteful, selfish, 40-gallon tanks of gas
And I can dwell on the fact that the patriotic or religious bumper-stickers
Always seem to be on the biggest
Most disgustingly selfish vehicles
[Audience laughter]
Driven by the ugliest -
[Interrupting audience applause]

This is an example of how NOT to think

[Chorus]
Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
D-D-Day after week, after month, after year
Day after week, after month, after year
D-D-Day after week, after month, after year
D-D-Day after week, after month, after year