Today, I have decided I will go to CVS.
I will put on a belt and socks and shoes,
put my keys and my phone in my pocket,
and walk toward the door. I will almost forget
my mask, but I will remember, put it on, and
once again walk toward the door.
I love going to CVS. I hate people. My mask
helps me reconcile these feelings. CVS
also helps. My local store has minimized
the role of other people in my purchasing
experience through its use of automated
checkout machines, emailed receipts,
a rewards program based on a virtual card
that is stored on my phone, tracking my every
move and purchase so that I might not be bothered
with such things, and other innovations. I look forward to
the automatic doors sliding open for me, beckoning me
with the invisible light of their innumerable sensors,
their silent welcome nestling me into my nearest
branch’s warm, fluorescent arms. I relish this moment. I
consider the fact that my father briefly worked
at Walgreens — a major CVS competitor. CVS
brings with it the possibility of resolution
of childhood trauma. CVS is what the self-help
books I read on the basis of my therapist’s
recommendation tell me I have been looking for
in a partner. It was right there in front of me
all along, just past the corner of happy & healthy,
at the intersection of Convenience, Value, and Service.
I want to take off my shoes and socks and feel the store’s
abrasive carpet on my feet. I want to rub my
body on every available surface and belt out
as many words as I remember of “All For You,” “Kiss Me,”
“Always Be My Baby,” and other 90s favorites. I want to splatter
my humanity all over this store’s palette of eggshell and teal.
But I will restrain myself. I am an only child. I will consider
what this moment of life compels me to buy.
As I check myself out with a convenience only the absence
of workers can afford, money seeps out of me. I don’t
exchange it so much as I allow it to flow in response
to the flow of goods into my Gem House USA Pavilion
tote bag. The money I give is mostly an idea. It’s a
particular formation of language having something to do
with power. Most of the words involved are numbers.
The technical term for this is Near Field Communication.
The money feels like water or the idea of water or something
else of similar viscosity. This money flowed into me from my employer,
through a rivulet carved into the earth over many years
by the caste ascribed to my ancestors and subsequently to me
because of our similar appearance. While much of my employer’s money
comes from taxpayers and the surplus value of my work —
which is to say, from me — due to the nature of my work,
I can only assume the remainder of my employer’s money
flowed there from medical students. Demographic information
tells us that this money flowed to them primarily from their
wealthy parents. I imagine one of these parents being
Larry J. Merlo, president and CEO of CVS who, in a 2015 SEC filing,
reported the highest CEO-to-average-employee pay ratio
of any American company. And so the money,
having flowed through many different streams and over many
different fields, now returns to the lake from which it came.
Welcome home, money. The lake has missed you.
Now imagine where that money came from. Imagine longer journeys.
Imagine the ocean and sky. From the depths of that ocean, millions of
people call out to their money.
Sgr A*
William Hazard makes poems with computers. Recent work can be found in Ghost Proposal, Beloved Radio, Audio Flare Gun, and on GitHub. He teaches at Temple University. He edits at Overpass Books. He hangs out at llllllll.co