Stripped: To the soul who found my grocery list

The other day as I was unloading groceries into my car, the wind picked up my grocery list and carried it into the sky in a whir of motion. I watched the white paper against the storm clouds flit at an impressive pace across the parking lot, rising toward the city buildings beyond the street. The paper rode so high I watched it sail for what seemed like a mile at least. I stood by my empty grocery cart, bewitched. (Really. The baby was chillin' in her car seat, the milk getting warm, and I'm just standing there all wind-blown, my mouth hanging open.) Who is going to find that? I thought, and then felt the sudden need to make sure I'd fully dressed.

If you are the innocent who stumbled on that list and read it, you know these things: I didn't get my sweet potatoes, black beans, granola, or eyeliner. You might wonder why some items were highlighted blue, others circled, and others with black dots next to them. The answer is that I often wonder this, too. Why did I circle the cremini mushrooms? Maybe you can tell me.

If you've read my list, you have definitely noticed that sometimes I just don't have time for vowels. You might assume I'm some healthy foodie because I buy nonfat plain yogurt and black strap molasses. But what you won't know is that I accidentally bought 10% milk fat Greek yogurt last time and I will now have to spend the next two months mixing it with the nonfat plain in an attempt to remain in my current pant size. You also won't know that the entire jar of molasses turned itself over while we slept, the stuff slithering over three shelves of food and under my fridge, where it still sits in a sticky pool, mocking me.

If you read my list and thought, "A female wrote this," you'd be right.

Once, back in my undergrad days, my boyfriend and his roommates found a shopping list on the ground inside the local grocery store, and its contents amused them so much they brought it home to display on the fridge. That list--its quirky spellings and obscure ingredients that I can no longer recall (mom brain)--popped up in conversations for months and I know we shed plump tears from laughter. Yet I remember even then feeling a little bit like I had trespassed.

If you discovered my flighty shopping list, know this: I felt naked as I watched it--two weeks worth of collection--slip away.