Local opinion: Why I shop at the dumpiest Wal-Mart in town

Walmart reportedly has 16 stores in our town. Some are Supercenters in whose parking lots you’ll find Teslas. Those are the upscale Walmarts.

I frequent the dumpiest Walmart in Tucson, where you meet drug-addled young men and afflicted young women looking horribly vulnerable. Neighbors shun it as dangerous and dirty. Here, shop residents from neighboring low-income apartments, among whom are Sudanese refugees with stories you can barely imagine and headscarved women looking disoriented. It’s where you go for ethnic diversity — racist covenants having carved up the city long ago and university renters crowding out Black homeowners these days.

Staff turnover and low morale trigger one-star reviews of this Walmart on Yelp. They complain of filth, spoiled meat and disdainful workers. Some reviewers identify as folks on limited income but don’t mention the government’s miserly indifference to the cost of living. No one complains of an obscene federal minimum wage ($7.25) frozen for the last 15 years. It’s not a pretty picture.

Often, you’ll find a police cruiser outside and security guards at the front door. Inventory shrinkage and theft have apparently escalated as inflation pinches poor and working-class folks. Next door, the Dollar Tree offers tooth-destroying junk food. Wizened old ladies and skeletal men in dirty clothes tarry along the canned goods aisle for instant ramen or the little freezer section to choose an evening repast. Remarkably, these shoppers show a friendliness and affability not often found among Whole Foods shoppers, at least in my experience.

Why would I, a professional with a Harvard degree, deliberately go to either of these two stores? Maybe it’s because I knew poverty at an early age, remember brown sugar sandwiches when the kitchen was empty, ate only fried onions and a hot dog dinner every night for months when I was 20. It was all I could afford after leaving an abusive husband while trying to stay in college on loans and scholarship.

I go to this Walmart (1) to jolt myself out of complacency, (2) because it feels comfortable, and (3) because I don’t mind saving money. You can converse with anyone over the weather. A young woman smiles when you thumbs-up her pink hair and matching backpack; the crazily tattooed young man answers readily when asked what those cool designs mean; old ladies tutor you on the best toilet cleaner. And, when, at the checkout, you slip a $20 bill into the hands of an unsuspecting mother of three who never asked for it, you get a warm feeling that no tax deduction delivers.

I go out the door grateful for what I have, yet I feel a little crushed. When you see how folks get by on so little, sometimes holding down two jobs and still not having enough to live decently, you ask questions. Why do I have so much and yet envy those with higher incomes, nicer homes, fancier cars? How does that boney, near-toothless young mother feed her two hungry kids? How can we weep over the insulted and the injured in literature and have no compassion for our brethren suffering right here, on the edge? And let’s talk political responsibility: what happened to the old War on Poverty — something no candidate mentions today? What connection do the otherwise invisible poor have to the two figures running for President?

You can go to this Walmart for what Thoreau called a “Realometer” when he was seeking out the root meaning of “necessity” — nec esse — the not-to-be substance without which we can’t properly live. At Walden Pond, he had just enough to get through the year: a self-built cabin (ludicrously tiny), a few books, a hearth, table, chair and bed. Who among us would dare what he did? Ah, Reality TV, you reply — that fraudulent excuse for entertainment, where contestants are monitored, rescued, and awarded big bucks.

Maybe, dear reader, you might consider shopping at the dumpiest Walmart in town for the experience of a Realometer. How else will you know your brother, your sister, and their unmet needs?