Zen and the Art of Market Basket

Embrace the chaos—and the beef feet—and you will be free.

I am not a fan of crowded and chaotic situations. Being herded through customs or security checkpoints at airports, exiting or entering shows and sporting events, attempting to get a table at a restaurant with a large group of people and no reservation—these things all make me feel like I can’t quite get enough oxygen in my lungs and temporarily hate being human.

But the older I get, the better I find I am at remaining patient, detached, and even serene in these situations. I think it’s because I’ve gotten much better over time at accepting my absolute powerlessness in the face of…well, pretty much everything.

I also have a practice—a workout routine, if you will—to help me strengthen my ability to remain placid in the midst of chaos and the unrelenting crush of humanity:

I shop at the Chelsea, Massachusetts Market Basket.

If you don’t live in eastern New England, then you may not have had the singular experience of grocery shopping at a Market Basket. (Or, DeMoula’s, if you’re old school.) And that experience is, in a word, crowded.

This is mainly because Market Basket is much, much cheaper than the other supermarkets around—Stop & Shop, Shaw’s, Star, Hannaford, Trader Joe’s*, etc.—and has incredible selection and availability. You can get all of your standard American supermarket fare—like, all of it: a dozen brands of tomato sauce, twenty different kinds of yogurt, seven-thousand kinds of breakfast cereal—as well as some of the bougie stuff—Bob’s Red Mill organic quinoa, Annie’s overpriced mac and cheese, Jeff and whoever’s free-range eggs, etc. Plus baked goods, prepared foods, and generic products galore.

Each Market Basket store also carries an immense selection of items that cater to the local immigrant populations. Do you need taro? Beef or pork feet? Chinese mustard greens? Haitian soup mix? A very particular type of cheese from El Salvador? Market Basket is the place for you. (Void in New Hampshire locations.)

This entire display case is dairy products from Latin America.

Technically they’re cow feet.

But with all this selection and such fabulous prices ($2.50 for Wheat Thins! CAN YOU EVEN?) you’re going to have to navigate your way around lots of other people and their shopping carts. You’re also going to have to get around the staff constantly restocking the shelves. It’s nearly impossible to find a Market Basket aisle that doesn’t have at least one employee unpacking boxes. And speaking of aisles, in some store locations they are maddeningly narrow. (I’m looking at you, Somerville.)

When I was younger and less enlightened—like, three years ago—I used to avoid Market Basket like the plague. I could not deal with the traffic jams and sensory overload. I was willing to pay a little more for the more refined shopping experience that is Stop & Shop. But with inflation and price gouging sending grocery prices sky high, I started occasionally venturing to Market Baskets, albeit with gritted teeth and a racing pulse. I would leaving feel drained.

It was my good pal Marah who helped me change my entire attitude toward the Market Basket shopping experience. She was and is a big fan of the (immense) Chelsea Market Basket, which is near the rock gym where we climb together. She told me that her secret to survival is to go in with the right frame of mind, knowing that, yes, it will be crowded and congested and overwhelming, and choosing to accept that fact and just be present, letting it all wash over you as you appreciate the grand pageant of humanity.

The grand pageant of humanity!

Indeed, that is the beauty of the Chelsea, Massachusetts Market Basket. (And many other locations. Void in New Hampshire.) You will see people of every size, shape, race, class, age, and ethnicity. You will see women in hijabs and/or Patagonia fleece and men in dashikis and/or Vietnam Veteran caps. You will see people from every Spanish-speaking country in the world, with the possible exception of Spain. (Two-thirds of the population of Chelsea is of Latin American origin.)

As you make your way through the store, you will see old people, young people, babies, children, and beings you suspect are not of this realm. You will see people who are completely oblivious to everyone around them, who park their cart dead-center in the middle of one of the aisles and completely block the flow of traffic while they stand scrutinizing the vast Goya bean selection. You will see people who do not share your notion of what constitutes an appropriate amount of personal space. You might even see someone taking pictures of the Beef Feet.

You will also encounter people who seem to be truly enjoying themselves. Or who are at least more or less neutrally content. People who are definitely not freaking the fuck out at the sheer chaos of it all.

One of those people COULD BE YOU! Like my wise friend said, the secret at Market Basket is to accept what is and focus on the wonder of it all: the people, the bounty, and the mulitcultural miracle that is America.

Also, while you’re there, be sure to appreciate the the well-oiled machine that is the Market Basket workforce: Efficient, polite, spiffy. The boys and men are all required to wear ties, the women at the registers are paragons of productivity, and the checkout lines move at an impressive clip. If anyone loathes their job, they hide it well. (The company is, apparently, very good to its employees, which probably has something to do with their overall pleasantness; in fact, ten years ago, Market Basket employees throughout the region went on strike when the Board of Directors tried to oust the beloved CEO.)

The other secret to Market Basket survival is to keep your breath steady and for God’s sake keep things in perspective—especially in the produce section. Navigating this part of a Market Basket (any Market Basket, even in New Hampshire) is kind of like being in a game of Pac Man, but if there were leafy greens and twenty times as many ghosts. But not ghosts that want to kill you; just ghosts that have a tendency to get between you and the cilantro—which is their goddamned right. You just have to wait your turn. Breathe. It’s all good.

The produce section. Deep breaths.

Same goes when you’re trying to maneuver between carts in a crowded aisle. Let yourself be bemused by the craziness of it all! Smile! Nine times out of ten, the person you’re doing the you-go-no-you-go cart dance with, or who you almost plow into coming out of the toilet paper aisle, will smile back. Tensions dissipate. Cultural differences melt away. The outside world in all its strife and division is gone. There is nothing but this vast food wonderland, and all of us here being human together, trying to get past the employee restocking the Maruchan Instant Lunch.

It’s all going to be OK.

I’ve puzzled over this sign many times, trying to figure out what, exactly, “Ethnic Foods” means in this context. Also: I had no idea there was a substantial Bosnian community in Chelsea, but apparently there is? Or maybe Bosnian groceries are just particularly awesome and I’ve been missing out. Must try some next time.

So there you have it. I never would have thought I would come to appreciate (and enjoy) my Market Basket forays as much as I do, and I certainly didn’t think they would become a quasi-spiritual practice. But I honestly think they are helping me become a better person. Or, at least, a more patient and even-keeled one. Most of the time.

See you in the produce section.

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All posts on Jane’s Calamity are free and publicly available, but writing is how I make my living. If you enjoy my strange brand of Substacking, and/or if you’d like to support my Market Basket habit, please consider upgrading to a paid subscription. Or, hey, buy my book!

P.S. I am not alone in my love of Market Basket. It’s sort of a thing in the Greater Boston Area and beyond. See below from a January post from Boston.com (I’m guilty of the seventh item, clearly) and check out the People of Market Basket Facebook page for some excellent local flavor, including Massholes arguing about politics in the comments.

P.P.S. Here’s another post about me attempting (but in this case failing at) mindfulness, and why I’d be a terrible Buddhist monk.

*Trader Joe’s is not a real supermarket.