Time to spare

“Do you have time for this?” my husband, Peter, asked.

Peter almost never questions what I’m doing unless I’m doing something particularly stupid. Yesterday, I had a meeting on Zoom. I figured I could finish my work, take my walk early, then run downtown and get my errands done all in time for my meeting.

“Sure!” I assured him. Peter looked skeptical. “Maybe I’ll skip the stop at the hardware store,” I added, to pacify him.

But the hardware store was right on the way as I went from the library to the grocery store, so I dashed in, got my paint roller and potting soil and dashed back out.

“Plenty of time!” I assured myself as I hit the grocery store, chose two graduation cards in record time, grabbed wrapping paper, ribbon and a bunch of flowers.

It wasn’t until then that I noticed there were people standing in the aisles.

“Why are people standing in the aisles?” I wondered.

But I continued my high-speed chase and picked out two bags of grapes and six Honeycrisp apples.

Only when I had gathered everything from the four corners of the store did it dawn on me what those people were doing, standing in the aisles. They were waiting to check out.

“What?!” I said aloud, outraged.

“It’s always like this at 4:30,” a smiling fellow, standing in the seemingly endless line, said to me when he saw my face.

“Half an hour earlier, there’s no one in the store.” Apparently, I had never been in the store at exactly 4:30 before.

“But ... I don’t have time for this!” I said to no one who cared — or could do anything about it.

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