by Tim Westover
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But who am I to criticize? I am no one special. I am a two-bit ex-con peddling orange juice, and yes, sometimes I do dream of our hands outstretched in limbo, the hairs on our knuckles brushing. This haunts me. But say, we touch—what then? Between the grove and my hand to the box of orange juice and your cart, a chasm yawns wide and dark and enormous. And in this unknowable space between us lies history. The ghosts of orange juice past, politicians and CEOs parsing graphs, people opening restaurants and refrigerators across the globe on Saturday mornings, shaking sleep from their heads and reaching for something. Whatever this thing they reach for might be—whether or not it actually is orange juice—the desire for success is instinctual, and orange juice is a decent substitute for most of what haunts us. Whatever it is, whatever this thing might be, whether we are brushing hands in limbo or fucking or holding each other at a funeral or laughing at a stranger’s jokes in bars, that gulf still spreads between us, and I think you will agree it is a distance all its own.
These are the things I dwell on, Average-Yet-Discriminating Grocery Shopper, as I queue up to bring you more orange juice.