Grocery Types ... (Take 2)-

There's the person walking up and down the frozen food or produce aisles who is neither amused nor having a good time. The look on their faces is sour, as if they had just mistakenly eaten by mistake that Green Sour Cream in the back of the fridge since Obama had dark hair. Best, by the way, not to initiate conversation with them -- just in case they've recently sharpened their incisors.

At least some of these people are from the Sub-tribe of Clan Anthropos that hates not only the living but life, itself. We give the word "living" to those things that change in relatively short amounts of time. People, Animals, Plants, ..., maybe even Rivers and their Beds. Living things are forever in a state of flux ... they seem to never stand still. I can plan on where to place a rock in a garden ... not so easy to decide where Raspberry Bushes should grow, nevermind the vines that grow wherever they want, pretty much.

These people hate surprises. If the Grocer changes the placement of their Bran Flakes or Prune Juice (especially, if they're Last Quarter types), they'd rather go or not go without rather than seek out the new secret shelf on Aisle D. Change your mind about when you'd like to meet for coffee? "No thanks. Let's just forget it." These, curiously, are often people who fear and hate death but are, in many ways, drawn to the inert ... to the dead. Change is unacceptable and their ideas are rigidly caught in a lock-step march. They are the most dogmatic of students.

I remember a magical moment in 1969 from one of my previous incarnations. I was teaching -- of all things -- a university course in Mathematics. When I got to something or other which is now lost in History, a student raised his hand and said: "But my last teacher told me to do it this other way." Fair enough! I gave him an example where that "remembered" method yields an unacceptable answer ... unacceptable? because it was obviously wrong. (nasally) "But my other teacher ...." After the fourth or fifth plaint that even though his present teacher's method yielded an answer he recognized to be correct and his last teacher's method gave the wrong answer, still and all: "But my last teacher ...." ... After all that, I looked him in his eye and said, as only a young professor can: "And your Mother told you she was a virgin."

It's quite amazing but -- in a flash -- I found myself transported to the Dean's Office being asked to explain myself. The Dean was not amused (maybe he was one of the life-haters) when I admitted to him: "Well. True enough. I didn't rightly know whether he was adopted." I don't imagine that I had much impact on the student or the Dean but I did learn that resurrection of the dead was no easy task.

I'll leave it for anyone reading to imagine how these folk could rain on Robin Williams' birthday party ... but they can. Death is all around them and any form of spontaneity in thinking or acting will get them pissed off.

Beware!