I find myself in Zionsville, IN for the holidays this year. Having attended college in Bloomington, IN, every time I come to the Hoosier state I embark upon something of a nostalgic trip down memory lane. Well…it was college, so maybe more of a memory cul de sac. Nonetheless, while I could never live in this state, I always enjoy the visits. If you get a chance, give it a whirl. The people could not be more friendly, there is every kind of fast food you have ever heard of (and some you haven’t), and it is really easy to relax. Mostly because the sort of 1st gear velocity of life here forces you to do so. (Seriously. I stood in line behind a person today who took nearly 8 minutes to order a plain coffee at Starbucks. Do that inside the beltway and you face a federal indictment. It was nice though that the cashier and I learned all about her detailed plans for the New Year.  And her ailing hip. And her world famous squash casserole. And her poodle.)

Not sure about your holidays, but seems to me that my days are way less busy than my evenings. At night there is a multitude of parties, receptions, visiting, etc. (BTW, I love it when people “just want to visit”. What does that mean? Am I doing it right? How do you know when a visit is over? Is it acceptable to swill bourbon during a visit?) My days however are pretty thin on activities. So much so that I often crave simple tasks just so I feel like I am doing something.  For example, today I was asked to head to SUPERTARGET and purchase Diet Dr. Pepper and a sled. Upon being asked, I jumped up from the couch, donned my gay apparel and set out to turn what should take about 30 minutes into a task worthy of EVM. Little did I know, it would change me in ways I will never forget.

Upon arriving at the SUPERTARGET  I was presented with the daunting task of navigating my way through people and things of all shapes, sizes and states of animation. (And yes, SUPERTARGET is one word and should always be completely capitalized. They can be seen from space by the naked eye.) So I say to myself, ‘Self….if you were in charge of information architecture for this behemoth of junk, where would you put the sleds?” I stare up at the signs for the departments and am baffled. Here is what I see:

• Small Electrics
• Women’s
• Flu Shots
• Shoes
• Produce

Weird. Not sure I can place  a sled into any of those categories. So I begin my now fabled trek into the belly of the behemoth. I pass all sorts of other departments like Jewelry, Boy’s, Men’s, Teen’s, Octogenarian’s, Sporting Goods, Colts (yes, there is an entire department dedicated to the Indianapolis Colts), until off in the distance I spy a rising dust cloud and hear the rumble of what sounds like an active act of large-scale civil disobedience. A crookedly dangling sign with a torched reindeer appears to denote the correct department – Toys. Sweet. A sled is a toy, right? But why does it look like 28 Days Later?

After a short hike through Flowers, Garden, Spices, and Large Electrics, I arrive in Toys. And man oh man did I pick the wrong time to be in Toys. In addition to the deafening din of screaming little people, it appears some of them are actually climbing on the shelves. I can literally see the sugar emanating out of these tiny terrors like heat off a desert road. The parents seem to have given up, resigned to feeble and furtive glances of acknowledgement and apology in each other’s direction. I walk down an aisle filled with action figures but stop short when I see another non-parent dutifully taken out by a pack of raving 4-year olds. Poor guy never saw it coming. He put up a decent fight but there is no defense against a horde of tots fueled by Grandma’s Toffee Chocolate Crunch and gallons of Hi-C. After tackling their prey, one of them looks at me defiantly and actually snarls. I shudder and frantically search for a sled of any sort. At this point, I am running low on provisions and would gladly substitute a hubcap for this mythical sled. Anything will do. I just need to get out.

I spot a SUPERTARGET employee and kindly ask, “Could you point me toward to sleds, please?”

She senses the fearful strain in my voice and wanly smiles back. “They are in Clearance.”

I want, but decide not to scream “Clearance? Whiskey Tango Foxtrot is Clearance?!? And how would any normal human know that? You made me live through that horror movie only to state that there is a potentially more depraved circle of hell I will have to sift through to find a simple sled? POINT ME TOWARD AUTO PARTS!”

Instead I spring forward, steeling myself for the Clearance Department. As I walk away from the cacophony of pain, I am pleasantly surprised to find that while Toys was an active conflict, the Clearance department has the air of a Roman ruin or Civil War battlefield. Monumental and potentially horrible things happened here…but they were very, very long ago. Bare shelves littered with a half eaten candy cane, a ripped Christmas sweater, and an wooden angel that appears to have been napalmed, are all that remain. The wind whistles and an very old man with one eye shuffles by me, mumbling something about shortbread strafing runs.

At the end of one still smoking aisle, I see my goal. Like a mountain climber reaching the summit of K2, I proudly stride forward, careful not to trip on the smoldering remnants of a country ham. There is a single sled left. A single glorious sled. I slowly reach forward, fearing it may not be real. As I grasp the handle of the SuperSled with Parabolic Turning Rails I feel a wave of triumph and joy flow through my tired and aching body. I have survived the unthinkable and completed my task.

To be continued….