Paper/Plastic Glory

By Chris Haddad

The old lady didn’t like the way I was handling her peas. She told me as much. “I saw
what you did to that man’s broccoli, carton of milk and sixteen cans of albacore tuna,
young man, and you are not going to do that to my frozen peas thank you very much.”

I gave her a glower followed by a severely insincere customer service smile. It was 1993.
I was a skinny, dour faced sixteen-year old doing my time in the service industry. I had to
wear a tie, a nice white shirt and a burgundy apron my mother has since learned to love
(she wears it every Christmas and Thanksgiving as she bastes turkeys and abuses
potatoes. )

I was a bagger – not bag boy, that’s sexist - at the Super Big Y super market in Worcester
Massachusetts. My own town, Grafton, didn’t have a market or “Grocery Store” of its
own, so I had to travel twenty minutes to Worcester where I’d spend nine-hour shifts
asking the endless hungry masses if they preferred paper, plastic or the dreaded . . .

“Paper in plastic” said the old woman, informing me straight out that she was not only
demanding and paranoid but also most likely evil.

I was, despite what the peas lady thought, a good bagger, or perhaps even a great one. I’d
studied the Big Y bagging handbook intently and prided myself on never once crushing a
loaf of bread or commingling hot foods with ice cream bars. Having mastered the basics
I’d moved on to covering two or even three aisles at a time, dashing from station to
station, coming to the rescue of harried and overworked cashiers. Mighty Mouse gained
his heroic powers at a super market and, I thought, perhaps I had to. I was a super bagger.
Ornery, easily bored and distrustful of smiles, perhaps, but most definitely super.

So it wasn’t a surprise when Todd, the mid-thirties, spiky-haired front-end supervisor

came up to me at the end of a particularly difficult shift. Todd had a tendency to ask the
male baggers to go on weekend ski trips with him, but today he was all business.

‘You bag very quickly” he said.

I gave a grunt. “Sure. Yes.”
It was true. One of my super bagging powers was a phenomenal speed that occasionally
scared uninformed, non-industry folk like the peas lady. The old pros were awe struck,
however,; they knew talent when they saw it.
“There’s a competition this weekend out in Somerville. A bagging competition.” He said.
“We need someone to represent us. To represent the whole store. Would you go?”
Another grunt. “Sure. Yes. Why not?” My secret identity beamed with pride as Super
Bagger tried to act nonchalant.

And so that Saturday my father and I hopped into his 1992 Ford Taurus and headed west
down the I-90 expressway. We listened to Jim Morrison and Rush Limbaugh as we
traveled, Dad drumming out “Backdoor Man” on the steering wheel as I checked the knot
of my favorite Jerry Garcia tie. It took us about 45 minutes to cross half the state and
another twenty wandering around the city before we found The Store. This was a doubly
Super Big Y. Several times the size of my own home branch, it could easily have housed
a mini-golf course and bowling alley alongside its flower shop, coffee kiosk and two-
dozen yards of freshly butchered meat.

We arrived barely on time. They’d sectioned off a few lanes at the end of the store and
put up a colorful frilly banner that said “Welcome Baggers” and “Good Luck.” A small
crowd had gathered, eager for the competition to begin. Big Y’s Massachusetts bagging
elite eyed each other nervously every one of us knowing that skill, not luck would
determine the winner of the day’s trial.

The rules were simple. Each of us would take a turn at the station, bagging a large and
diverse order. We’d be judged on speed, attitude and adherence to Big Y’s strict bagging
rules. I was on edge, standing there, staring at the alternately broad, confident smiles and
concerned frowns all around me. I was a big fish in Worcester’s small bagging pond but
here . . . these were the best of the best, super-baggers all.

The afternoon was brutal. A slightly obese Chinese girl broke down crying after fumbling
a carton of jumbo brown eggs. She was disqualified from the competition and ran quick
as she could from the store. A short bespectacled blonde boy froze at the counter, stuck
in a un-winnable staring contest with the bright blue bee-eyes on a box of honey nut
cheerios. After a solid still minute his mother pulled him from the box while cooing
empty platitudes in his ear.

And then it was my turn. My dad gave me a nod as I strode to the station. I wiped my
hands on my apron and tried, unsuccessfully, to force a smile to the edges of my mouth.
The time-keeper grinned at me, holding his stop watch high.
“Are you ready?” he said, the room suddenly dead quiet. I nodded
“Go!” he yelled while clicking the watch’s timer. The conveyor belt before me leapt into
action, a stream of cereal, canned fruit, feminine hygiene products and badly wrapped
fish rushing toward me. My oversize hands dove into the growing grocery heap, gripping,
grabbing and sorting. I lost all sense of time.
“DONE!” croaked the time keeper as I deftly placed a loaf of sour dough bread at the top
of my last bag. It was over. I was sweaty and out of breath. I wanted to rip the tie from
my throat. I’d been fast and skilled, but had it been enough?

An hour later I had my answer, it hadn’t: First place went to a grinning cheerleader type
from Spencer, second place to a lanky Revere basketball star.. I’d beat them both on time
but lost on form. I got third in the competition and won a small plastic medal, a T-shirt
and a gift certificate for, what else, groceries.

I was crushed as I left the store. I’d failed. This was my first professional failure. My
Super Bagging powers were nothing against a flirtatious wink, a charming smile and a
willingness to be gentle with peas. My Dad was fine with my abject failure right up until
he heard the grand prize: An all expenses trip for two to Honolulu to compete in the
bagging nationals. We used my twenty-five dollar gift certificate to buy beer and Kiebler
fudge sticks, crawled back into the Taurus and drove home in silence.