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Typically, I try my best to follow the rules which are established in, for example, a board game. If the rules say that I should collect $200 when I pass Go in Monopoly, then I collect $200 when I pass Go. Likewise, if the rules say that I must go to Jail if I roll three doubles in a row, then I go to Jail after my third roll of doubles. Rules exist in board games so that each player has a fair chance at winning. Without the set of rules, players wouldn’t know how to play the game, when to take turns or even, who would be declared the winner. The rules provide the order and structure for the board game and without them, there would be chaos.
Rules exist throughout all aspects of our everyday lives for the same reasons. There are generalized rules for how to drive, how to vote and how to change your oil. There are even more specific rules like when you can board a plane or find your seat in a theater. We are a society conditioned to follow the rules in order to maintain order. I do my best to comply with the rules as they are presented, but lately, I find myself having difficulty following the rules of which way I should walk down or up the aisle when I go to the grocery store.
In my defense, this is a new rule and I am not conditioned to follow it. In the past, whenever I went to the grocery store, I walked around in the manner that was most efficient to my personal shopping needs. If I needed some fresh vegetables, meat and some crackers, then I would typically head for the meat counter, pop over to the cracker aisle and finish with a perusal of the produce. Now, I have to make sure that I enter and exit the aisles according to the directional arrows on the floor, causing me to become stressed that I may make a mistake and get yelled at. In addition, trying to comply with the directional arrows causes me to walk down or up aisles I didn’t need to simply because I need to get to the next aisle.
On one recent occasion where I popped into the grocery store to pick up a few things, I inadvertently walked past the aisle I needed to go down, noticing that if I did indeed want to find the particular item I needed in the aisle, which was about 15 feet away from me, I would need to go down the next aisle and come back up. My arms were already tired from carrying the jug of lemonade I threw into my little hand carrier, so I considered becoming a rule breaker and entering the aisle from the wrong direction.
As I was contemplating my mental anguish in disregarding an obvious rule, I noticed a fellow shopper near me that I knew personally. Not wanting to blatantly mar my character, I did the only thing I could think of… I turned around and walked backwards down the aisle to my product of choice.
Follow? Follow?
Kathy Naumann, possessor of NATURALLY curly hair and the understanding that you can’t control everything!
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