Where I Belong

Do you love your neighborhood? Your city? Your grocery store?

Yesterday, the punk and I drove by our new house in Olympus Cove, which we will move into in a couple weeks. With the realtor's sign still in the ground, I felt like a voyeur, but my heart beat a little faster and I had to try not to become too giddy. We drove around the neighborhood and I was pleased to see that the other houses and yards look even better than ours. ("Not for long," said my man.)

Then we drove to the place where we will spend a few hours a month... the grocery store. I just wanted to check it out, okay? It's a little weird, I know, stalking groceries. My best friend/cousin and I used to walk from her house to this very Dan's in the summer to buy ice cream cones. It has changed drastically since then; its ginormous natural foods section caters to the hippies in the area, and the faux wood floors and serious deli satisfy the needs of my new hoity toity neighbors. I passed one lady who was asking the person at the fish counter, "Has this sockeye been frozen? No? Oh good!" Perhaps after a few years of living near her, I will develop a similar taste for unfrozen things. There were real cheesecakes and fresh guacamole (not that yucky whipped green stuff) and... get this. The deli even had freshly prepared sushi! My new grocery store has sushi! I didn't dare buy it, but maybe someday the punk and I will give it a try. We walked a few doors down to the real sushi place for lunch.

I have never been so excited to be a resident of Salt Lake City. I guess living in the boonies for 5 years gave me a new appreciation for my home town. I'm not usually one for cheese (unless it's Camembert), but... I feel like I've returned home.