Shout Out To America...

[RidingAgain]

When the run on supermarket items began, my wife asked me about what we should do. I told her if America ran out of food we'd have much bigger problems. So we just went about our daily routine of buying supermarket items on a daily basis. We had some things at home — including a few rolls of toilet paper — that, although not much, certainly helped.

I saw the shelves get emptied, and talking to my friends who work for Walmart (I shop there often and make it a point to get to know the workers I meet by their first name... It's what I saw my parents do) I knew it was going to be tight for a couple of weeks.

But my faith in this country was proven valid... Today I stopped in the Randalls at Manchaca, and at the Walmart near 71 and Mopac... And the stocks of goods was pretty good.

Having gone through what I did as a kid growing up in Jamaica during the mid-late '70s, empty grocery shelves is nothing new to me. The only difference is that in Jamaica the shelves were empty for years as foreign $$$s were hard to come by. It got to a point where my parents disposition of making friends with the store workers paid off and they would call my step-dad to let him know they were holding a case of some hard-to-find item for him. And you know what... Honestly, we never really thought we were short on anything... You simply learned to eat and appreciate what was available.

No... No one was starving. It was just a case of the things you had been used to having were either no longer available, or were just way too expensive for our wallet.

But back to this country... The good 'ol USA...

As  a kid I was a WW 1 & 2 buff... I had all the books, and I built models of planes and tanks (for some reason ships never really interested me). A big part of studying things about the wars was reading about what a difference the American economy could make once it got rolling. And although what I read was about an America 105 (WW1) and 75 (WW2) years ago... And although things have certainly changed in the country's culture... I was still confident of this country's ability and capacity to step up to the plate and recover. And to a certain extent, it has. At least for now... With the food supply.

Politricks aside... I believe this country — meaning the people of this country — still has what it takes. The capacity to work hard to push through hard times. And walking through the supermarkets today kind of reminded me of what I believe. And I give thanks for that.

Edited April 4, 2020 by RidingAgain