Joe’s been to the grocery market countless times in his 22 years, but after spending an afternoon watching Pink Floyd’s The Wall, smoking an eighth of marijuana alone and dropping acid, his Publix experience was much different then the others. For starters, someone decided a freakish carnival would make better use of the 20,000-square-foot store that was once occupied by the most pleasurable shopping facility.
Wearing combat boots, a parka and brown derby hat, Joe walks through the electronic turnstile and into the fluorescent circus.
“Hello sir,” an elderly woman dawning an apron gently says, “would you like try this chowder I just made?”
He’s standing in front of a cooking exhibition booth. Stunned that the decaying corpse speaks, Joe peeks over the counter and focuses on the steaming pile of marshmallows and centipedes. “Dear God,” Joe screams, “where do you people come from? That is sickening.”
“Have a nice day, Sir,” the lady mumbles.
Joe turns right and walks towards a field of strawberries, but not like Lennon’s. These strawberries are above him, floating high in the air—though this may be because he’s crawling through the linoleum jungle avoiding any enemies that might recognize his tall stature through the cereal box wall that metaphorically separates society and Joe.
He’s ventured deep into the tundra where time has been frozen, and life stands still, yet stares him the face. To sober individuals this is known as the fish counter.
“These damned fish wont stop starring,” Joe whispers as he stands to his feet and leans towards the curved glass counter-top.
“Sir, what can we get for you?” asks the Publix employee wearing a bright yellow rubber apron.
“Nothing, obviously, they’re all dead,” Joe says.
He walks towards aisle three: cookies, baking goods and Vietnamese insurgents— Luckily Joe wore his combat boots. The acid is in full effect and 1968, the deadliest year of the Vietnam War is resurfacing in Publix. Joe quickly falls to his knees, and then places both hands on the murky jungle floor. The rain has stopped, but his supply of water is running low. Three aisles to his left there is water, plenty of it, but two shelves in front of Joe is Charlie, the enemy.
He’s wearing a green vest, unloading heavy boxes onto the base camp’s artillery storage facility. His back is turned towards Joe, but at any moment he may hear Joe’s heavy breathing. Joe reaches for his grenades, a bag of mint-flavored Milano cookies. He bites the tip of the deliciously disguised grenade and launches it towards the enemy. The explosion goes off and Joe jumps to his feet, runs away from the stock-boy and finds shelter in the walk-in beer cooler.
Joe thinks he is dead but is resting in heaven. He sits on a royal throne of golden bottles, sips imported Red Stripe and closes his eyes accepting the eternal sleep. An hour later the store manager shakes Joe and wakes him up.
“Sir, you’ve been here over an hour, and it’s illegal to have an open container in the store,” the manager says. “We’re going to ask you to leave.”
“Sorry man, that was one fucked up acid trip."
Cheers,
Victor
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