Season 4 Step 1 Blog 31: 8198388

 8198388

On January 25th, 2022, I clocked into Kroger for a final time. I bagged, did carts, the whole time anticipation was building for 9:53. Finally, 9:53 came and I walked to clock out. As I stood at the time clock, I thought back on my time at Kroger:

While I thought back on everything, it would take too long for me to tell you it all… So I'm only going to tell you three stories. The first one takes place about two weeks after I got the job. I was bagging and a customer asked me if I knew where the gift cards were. I did, and I got super excited because this was the first customer I could actually help. As I was leading him to the gift cards, a woman was coming towards us with a cart. I keep my keys on a carabiner, on the first belt-loop of my pants on my right side. I stepped to the left to avoid the cart, but my right hip rubbed against it and I heard my carabiner clip onto the cart. The woman didn't realize what had happened and continued pushing the cart dragging me along with it.

The second story takes place in December 2018, nearly a year after I got the job. One of my bosses told me to do “go-backs” which is when you take items that were either forgotten or were not wanted and put them back on the shelves. Now, I was never good at this. In fact, when I first started working at the store I called Mom a few times to ask her where some items were. In any case, I noticed that the basket for the baking needs aisle was full so I put it in a cart and took it back. When I got to the baking aisle before I had even looked in the basket, I saw a woman with her son. The woman said, “I have a holiday party and I need gingerbread house kits, but there are none on the shelf. Do you know where any are?” I told her that if it wasn't on the shelf we didn't have any as it was the Christmas season and a lot of people were buying gingerbread kits. She in response asked for a manager.

We were really busy that night and when I told my front-end bosses, they didn't really want to deal with her so they called the store manager and he and I return to the baking aisle. The store manager and I search for 20 minutes all around the store trying to find any gingerbread house kits. Eventually, the woman took her son and left the store in a huff. The store manager left and I walked to my cart. When I looked in the basket I realized that every single item in it was a gingerbread house kit!

The last story takes place in June of 2019. I walked out into the parking lot to start my cart shift. As I walked towards a cart corral I noticed a woman in her late 80s or early 90s, riding in an electric cart. When she saw me, she asked me if I could help her unload her groceries into her car. I said yes and after we had finished, I took the electric cart back into the store.

When I walked back out into the parking lot, I looked over and saw that the woman was clutching her steering wheel and shaking. I ran back to the car ready to call 911. “Ma'am, ma'am, are you okay?” I asked frantically.

“Mitchell,” She said, “I need you to go back into the store and get the electric cart.”

“Sure… but why?” I asked confused.

“This is the wrong car!” She exclaimed.

I grabbed the electric cart and we quickly unpacked the car. The entire time the lady and I were laughing hysterically because of how hard it would be to explain why we were in the car If the owner came out.

After this, I thought back on when about meeting Noah for the first time. I thought about the time my former coworker Lily and I broke the glass front door. I thought about when August came home for a surprise visit in the middle of a Kroger shift and about the “Rubber Ducky Incident.” I thought about all the people I have met and all the memories I've made and I smiled because if given the chance I wouldn't change a thing. With my reflection done, I entered my Kroger ID number one last time: 8198388.

Have a Greattastic day and be safe!

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Season 4 Step 1 Blog 30: Blind Soccer

 Blind Soccer

When I first met Noah and we were getting to know each other, it came out that he has dreams of playing on the blind paralympic soccer team in 2028! As soon as I found out he played blind soccer I looked videos up on YouTube. I'm not a big sports guy, but I will say I was thoroughly impressed by blind soccer right away.

For those of you who have not experienced blind soccer Let me explain; to be on the field you need to be at least partially blind. Everybody on the field has to wear blindfolds so that the people who are "partially-sighted" don't have an unfair advantage. The only people on the field who are “sighted” are the goalies. The soccer ball is basically a glorified baby rattle, so whenever it's kicked the beads move around, and the players know where it is.

Now to get ready for the 2028 games, all across the country there are these blind soccer camps. Each camp is just one or two soccer games (as far as I know). Noah isn't a hundred percent sure how it works, but the way he sees it, the more of the camps he does the more chances he gets to make an impression and potentially get on the team. Back in October, we found out that one of the camps was going to be in Columbus in January.

My family saw Noah and Lori over Christmas break and we told them we were going to the game. As soon as we brought it up, Noah asked, “Mitch, which one of your brothers is a soccer goalie for St. Charles?” I told him it was Luke. It turned out that the previous week, Noah’s team had gone to a camp in Denver and their goalie had backed out and they needed a replacement… I think you can see where I'm going with this.

On the day of the game, Luke and I found the indoor soccer field. Noah was not on the field yet so I prompted Luke to go on and try to get to know the other team members. Since Noah was not with us, when Luke walked on a woman asked Luke who he was. I could tell that Luke was nervous so I intercepted the woman and introduced myself assuming that Noah had told her my name. As soon as I said my name she smiled. The woman introduced herself as Noah’s coach Katie. Surprisingly, Katie knew of me from some public speaking that I have done and through one of my teaching mentors Mr. (Pete) Livingston, with whom she went to church before he moved. After I talked to Katie for a minute, I found a seat with Mom and Dad along with, Noah's dad, stepmom, grandpa, and Lori’s immediate family.

Like I said, I'm not a big sports guy. While there are a few reasons that I have for this, a big one that I don't talk about a lot is sports stress me out! Literally every time someone got close to Luke's goal, I burned a couple months of my life. Still, it was really entertaining to watch. First of all, Noah lost where the ball was a few times when he was close to Luke. Luke would direct him on where it was and that made me really proud. Second of all while all the players were good, Noah was amazing. I understand as his friend I have a biased opinion. But, in all honesty, I could not keep my eyes off him, and I don't think our friendship had too much to do with that… Maybe a little bit, but the way he was playing I think I would have been watching him even if I didn't know him.

Even though I agree with Noah’s logic with going to as many camps as he can, I'm way more of a manifestation kind of guy. Like, I know he needs to go to these camps to get noticed, but I honestly believe he's going to be on a team, especially after seeing how well he played.

Have a Greattastic day and Be Safe!

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Season 4 Step 1 Blog 29: Something Has Got To Break

 Something Has Got To Break

On January 3rd, 2018, I walked into my local Kroger grocery store for an interview. As you are probably aware at this point, As I've written many installments based at Kroger, I got the job. This past Wednesday, I woke up and got ready for the day. I worked my New Story shift and then spent the few hours between New Story and Kroger writing.

I got to Kroger, clocked in, said hi to a few co-workers as I walked to start bagging. There were only three checkouts opened and only one needed a bagger. Now, the software that Kroger uses for check-out is from the 90s. Don't ask me why we don't update it, I don't have the answer! About 30 mins into my shift a man came through my checkout lane with his baby daughter. The baby was crying and the man tried to soothe her as he put his groceries on the belt. Unfortunately in the middle of his order the computer that is connected to the scanner and cash register froze. To unfreeze it we had to tell one of our bosses and she had to reboot it. Now neither I nor the cashier I was working with, had ever been on a register when it needed to be rebooted. We just assumed it would take 2 to 3 minutes… It wasn't until later that we found out it takes about 15 to 20.

Ten minutes in the baby was still fussing and the cashier and I assumed that the man was getting annoyed, cuz who wouldn't be? To defuse the situation the cashier sincerely apologized for the wait. “No, you're fine I understand!” The man replied, “I used to work for Kroger.”

“Oh,” the cashier asked, “how long did you work for the company?”

“10 years.” The man replied.

As soon as he said it, my first thought was, Oh man, I'm a year away from being halfway there!

Kroger is an okay job, I know a lot of people who have worked their lifetimes there… I personally have two problems. Firstly, I got my job at Kroger at the beginning of the third quarter of my senior year in high school. The plan was for me to keep this job through college and then I would quit when I became a teacher. While I ended up dropping out of college, and I'm not technically a teacher, I still got a job that I love, working at a school!

Secondly, I'm stretching myself super thin. I work at New Story from 8-3(ish), come home and write as much as I can, work at Kroger from 6 to 10, come home go to bed, and repeat. I don't really have enough time to promote my book, or look for a house, not to mention have a social life! Something has got to break and honestly if I keep going the way I am, it's going to be me! So the next day, after 4 years, I quit Kroger. While I still have two weeks before I am officially done, I can't wait to see what happens next!

Have a Greattastic day and be safe!

J. Mitchie Ulibarri