My Diary of Working Through Covid-19

April 25 

Sometimes people treat me as if I have the virus. 

“Is that mask washable? Do you wash it every day?” One woman brought a disinfectant spray that she sprayed the whole checkout belt with first and it smelled the rest of the day. It is like they think you are diseased. 

April 26 

Today one woman had a Gucci mask on. It just doesn’t seem right. I read a Yelp review of our store earlier, “They carry excellent chicken and have very nice cold cuts and salads. The help in King's are very accommodating and they have excellent quality food.” Okay, so that’s what I am, the accommodating help. 

May 2 

They told me that today I’d be working at checkout line 2, which was actually the first place I worked, where I was trained. It’s the old one that has not been updated. Sometimes you have to insert your credit card twice. 

I got some tea and lemon and went to my station at checkout line 2. It was different. There was a plexiglass cage around me. I had to move one side to get in. There, in the front, was a little hole around the credit card machine, where I guess I would give people their change if they paid in cash. Around the square was blue tape so that you could see the edges. I kept breathing the same air through my mask and also through the plexiglass cage. It tasted stale. 

I kept spraying the belts, the first one where the food is loaded and then the second one where the scanned food goes. I cleaned the scanner and the scale. I cleaned between almost every customer. I even cleaned the plexiglass cage, although it moved while I cleaned because it was suspended by chains from the ceiling. At register 5 last time, I kept looking at the chips that were on sale for $1.19. Today my view was of how the rotisserie chicken was only $5.99 on Tuesdays after 5 PM, which, when you think about it, is a pretty good deal. I looked at this sign because it was on the windows, and it was a nice day outside. 

My other view was of the new masks. They had all kinds of prints. One was a zebra stripe; one camo; one Day of the Dead skulls. I kept wondering why anyone would want to be reminded of death while quarantined for a pandemic, but whatever. No one bought these or the giant bottles of hand sanitizer either. For a while, you couldn’t buy masks or hand sanitizer, now we have boxes of 50 masks and more sanitizer than you could use in a year. 

May 13 

Man: “our whole family had it. It was bad for three weeks and now we are better.” Another woman: “I just came from getting tested but I don’t know the results.” Me: wondering why she was in the store. 

May 14 

Woman: “when you take your gloves off, do you take them off inside out and one inside of the other?” This was an actual question. What is she even asking? I wanted to ask her if she did that or if her concern was just about me. 

One man came for a drink that was $5.29 and a plastic container of cut-up brussels sprouts. When the brussels sprouts rang up as $12.95 he asked me to take it off and I did. This man was wearing a wrinkled pink Oxford shirt and khaki shorts. His debit card did not go through for the drink, and I called him back, as he was walking out. So he tried it again but it still didn’t work. He said he would get his other card from his car but did not come back. 

A woman said she wished her husband was still alive so she could argue with him in quarantine. “Paper or plastic?” “Yeah.” 

May 17 

A young woman is panicking because she has no service. She is thin, brown-skinned with a pretty face and big eyes framed with lots of eye makeup. Her top is golden; her harem pants are an aqua-blue. Her carrier does not get service at this Kings. She works for Instacart and can’t do her job without the Internet. She is asking everyone, her eyes wide with fear. She drove here and now can’t fill the order. But the manager tells her the one spot she can get service and she is so relieved. She goes back and forth to that spot to fill the order. 

Instacart is a way for people to get their groceries without actually entering the store. They are shopped for and delivered by others. Instacart is popular in this neighborhood. Outside, cars bake in the sunny parking lot. Just to give you an idea, I see a Mercedes, BMWs, Land Rovers and Porches. I have seen two Teslas. 

May 18

So, unbelievably, an older woman comes up to me, not wearing a mask, and asks why we let younger people in the store. It was 9:39. Only the 7 AM-8 AM hour is reserved for the elderly and at-risk shoppers. So it’s way past that and I tell her. She says it’s not long enough. She wanders around but leaves without buying anything. I told the manager and he knows about her, as she has come in before and refuses to wear a mask. Why? It makes her uncomfortable. Another customer said that her doctor told her not to wear a mask because of her underlying condition. The manager just said that is why she should be wearing a mask. 

I don’t know if this is possible, but I have been trying to group people by what kind of muffins they buy--blueberry, chocolate, crumb cake, etc. I’m trying to find a pattern in ice cream flavors as well but have not. 

With the weather a little warmer, people are buying ice cream, corn-on-the-cob and steaks to grill. Women are now wearing sundresses and shorts. Every day I have to wear my uniform, my name badge, and black pants or leggings. I must wear black shoes, no sandals. 

May 24 

So, working all of Memorial Day weekend. It has not been busy. Lots of people buy things to grill, though, and flag-themed cookies, paper plates and napkins. Charcoal. And meat. You wouldn’t believe the expensive things people are buying, like a beef tenderloin that cost $119.90 and soft shell crabs that are $6.99 each, and one man got eight. And a coho salmon for $48.50. Someone was in the store today wearing a Burberry face mask. 

One man explained that for Memorial Day, his cul-de-sac was having a social distancing party. He wore cargo shorts and a logo t-shirt. One of the neighbors is a singer-songwriter and he will be playing live music. There will be a bar-be-que with social distancing. That sounded really nice. I’ll be inside all weekend. 

May 26 

For a few days now, we have to answer some health questions and contact questions as well as have our forehead temperature taken when we come in. 

There is a man who walks slowly into Kings and uses the bathroom. Afterwards, we have to close the bathroom until it is cleaned at night. He does not buy anything. I have to go to the basement to use the bathroom there before I leave. The basement is a place I normally avoid. It is a little scary. There are lockers and a break room but I don’t go there. There is also a storage area. I guess most grocery stores are like this, but this is the first one I have worked in, and I think it is a very old building. There are no windows as it’s underground and dark and old. I hurry back upstairs. 

I just wanted to say that, despite everything, I am very grateful for my job. I have somewhere to go every day. The people I work with are really nice. Of course, we stand all day in a little plexiglass cubicle, but still, it is good to see people and be able to interact with them. Also, they have been giving us $10 toward a “free lunch” every day, too, but just until the end of May. 

May 27 

There were a regular number of cashiers today, but since the scale on one of the registers was broken, that one was closed and I became a bagger. 

I did the late shift, meaning staying until the last person leaves the store, and then cleaning. I use a special cleaner and paper towels to go over all handles in cases, the magazine racks and the newspaper area. Cashiers are supposed to clean their area before their shift is over. A man came in and wheeled all of the outdoor plants inside. Then he waited for the manager to count all of the cash trays so that he could take them and deposit the money at a bank. He had one of those armored trucks. By now it’s dark. People (all men) are coming in with boxes and boxes of items that they replenish the shelves with. I guess I never thought about this before, that this has to happen every night, and that there are people who work the overnight shift to make sure everyone else can buy groceries during the day. 

May 27 

Someone was sent home today. He is a young employee. When we go in, we have to answer some questions, like, have we been around anyone with Covid-19? Do we feel well? And then they take our temperature with a forehead thermometer. Brad had to go home and cannot return until he has a doctor’s note. His temperature was 100.2 degrees. As he walked past us, his head was down and he said, “I’m sorry.” 

May 28 

Overheard a man speaking: “Yeah, my weekend starts tomorrow.” (Shifts mean that some work Wednesday-Sunday, etc. The weekend is different for everyone. Mine have been Wednesdays and Fridays. But not always. It changes.) He continued, “I just can’t wait to take this mask off. Freedom. Every time I take that mask off it’s like a vacation. I never appreciated the little things before.”

I have blemishes under my mask now. I guess from wearing it for hours. One of the ladies who went through my line today was talking about how she does not need to use lipstick anymore. She was dressed all in black, with a yellow leather purse with cutouts. She had medium-length brown hair and brown eyes, with heavily defined brows. I agreed with her and just casually mentioned how I was getting blemishes and she was extremely nice about it, but gave me her business card. She sells skincare, and told me that it is excellent for breakouts. I guess maybe she didn’t think that someone who is a grocery store clerk can’t afford a skincare line. I mean, I buy Noxzema and that’s it. But she was nice about it. 

May 31 

There is no more “free lunch,” literally. And beginning tomorrow, we can’t have a drink, even water, at our station. We can’t keep our cell phones there, either. We are speaking through a mask all day to customers but we can’t have water? As a new person, I don’t feel as though I could say anything, but I am really confused. 

June 1 

As we are all in plexiglass cages, I think it’s pretty safe. But yesterday, an older woman with a purple shirt that had long pom-pom ties, made a “shooing” motion with her hand toward the cashier next to me. I am not joking. Like she was a fly or something. 

“Paper or plastic?” I asked. She just stared into space. 

If people forget their loyalty card, with the bar code, they can give me their phone number instead. Some people recite it r-e-a-l s-l-o-w-l-y as if I am slow. 

June 3 

An older woman came in. She had on a light khaki pair of cotton pants, a beige sweater and her hair was in the old-fashioned style of teased up and out. It was kind of beige, too. She got a few slices of mortadella. It was $2.38. I said, “You came in just for that?” (thinking that it was risky) and she said, “When you need mortadella, you need mortadella.” I smiled but she could not see. She was a nice lady. 

Many people say as they leave, “Be safe.” They are kind and glad that I am there. I am glad that they are shopping at the store and giving me a job. “You too,” I say. “Have a good day.”

A man dressed in dark clothes with a shaved head said to me, “At least you still have your job,” and almost made me cry. He didn’t know that I had lost two jobs and my health insurance in 2020. Someone told me to apply for an “essential” job as they are the only ones hiring. 

June 8 

When I came back from my 15-minute break, my cup was gone. I had my tea in it. The manager told me they threw it out and I might want to get another one. The inspector was in the store and they called having a covered container of tea unsanitary. 

“Paper or plastic?” “Credit. Oh, sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”