If I was granted but one glorious wish today I would surely forego the tempting but selfish crowning of my own head and use those precious words, uttered aloud, for something a bit more…altruistic. Everywhere I ride I see these things blowing around, reminding me of the ever-present headwind I’m due to face.

So, upon my high horse, I would ask for nothing more than the instantaneous vaporization of every God-forsaken white plastic grocery bag I can see. No, more than that, I would wish for the instantaneous vaporization of every God-forsaken plastic grocery bag ever created! Ha Ha Ha!

The wind whispers past my ear – you’re such a selfish prick!

All the good masses leaving the grocery stores chatting up what’s next on the afternoon’s to-do and relishing their two for one savings; those who left their carts behind, plastic handles hooked on fisted fingers, would be suddenly open-mouthed but speechless, wide-eyed but processing, fingers slicing through nothing but a bag that once was, a wisp of white smoke – nothing.

Gone are bags carrying groceries, those loaded into cars, those in hand, in the cart; those not yet in use, standing at the ready to the left of every bored blank-faced cashier; those at home now stashed in a pantry; those holding snotty tissues, trash bags in the bathroom; poop bags for the dog’s walk; those slipped over a foot, an impromptu waterproofing; those wind-blown and tangled in sharp barbed wire fences; those held tight by roadside tumbleweeds, hostages in a battle for every last gust of the wind’s affection – and even those floating free, skipping across an empty lot, giggling as the wind lifts and carries them weightless – Phoof – and they’re gone.

I, staring at my curled fingers then to the ground beside my brogues where a warm rotisserie chicken and six pack of Pabst Blue lie broken on the parking lot’s pavement. Fuck! While a can of Campbell’s soup and a perfect cantaloupe, fragrant and ripe, roll slowly toward the low storm drain. Five minutes to pick that one. Five minutes!

Flocks of small black birds, tame now from their kowtow to convenience, had been disgruntled in their choice of livelihood – having to pick dried insects from the grills of parked cars or hoping all day that someone drops a candy wrapper is not how we were meant to live! Today though, they looked past their unhappiness the moment the bags disappeared in a new found verve, a zest for life. Holy shit, it’s happened! Our prayers! Answered, we will feast tonight! We will feast!

A quick look around and I see I’m not the only one who, foregoing a cart and walking out, was now left in a bag-less pickle, the same white smoke wafting skyward and the same dumbfounded puzzlement from all the others milling about the lot trying to gather what they can, what isn’t broken.

A gentle breeze picks up and the smoke dances with life, back and forth, shifting, dipping and spinning. The wind, it seems, is none too eager to let go its beloved, one last dance my sweet. While all along the fencerows and graded roadsides, jealous tumbleweeds shudder and rejoice. How do you like that Lover? The wind is ours alone!

The white smoke fills the air now which reeks of rot and outright panic. I’m still standing there in the middle of the parking lot, watching as rancid smoke billows from electric doors and grocery store patrons flee the stench, grabbing short breaths through cupped hands or elbows draped across worried faces as they run.

The market looks as if it’s ablaze yet without a flicker of flame; alarms begin to ring and whine all over town; the old landfill to the south heaves three feet of heavy dirt cover then detonates Mount St. Helen’s style as decades of accumulation erupt in a second’s release. Cans and bottles and all manner of putrescence, light and heavy, fresh and old, rain down through thick and choking dust and everywhere the white smoke joins with its ghostly brethren to form a thick pale blanket that descends on the surface as night. Nowhere to hide now wishmaker. Hum?