Working at a Grocery Store During the Pandemic: Clean

"I’m trying to see the positive, be humorous, and uplift others. But it’s hard at the end of the day when I’m with my thoughts."

Most of Fresh Market’s cleaning crew quit once COVID-19 hit the United States. Who could blame them? It didn’t concern me until I learned that our executive chef, Chef Mark, was pulling employees from prepared foods to help clean the store. I looked as busy as possible in the pizza department each day by engaging in several deep cleaning projects in my slice of the store, which was out of reach from customers and protected by a new Plexiglass shield, hoping Chef Mark would leave me alone.

But one day, when pizza had more than enough people working on a slow day, Chef Mark approached me to tell me I’d spend the rest of my shift cleaning items and areas of the store that posed the most risk for transmission. “Diego from the sanitation team will show you what to do,” he said.

“Okay,’ I said. A year later, when I had more clout, I would have told Chef Mark that cleaning wasn’t what I was hired for and that I wouldn’t do it. But I was only a few weeks into my employment at Fresh Market and I needed the job to help rebuild my resume.

After Chef Mark walked away, I went to the back of the pizza kitchen in the area where we all snuck sips of our beverages, and bites of wings, tenders, and pizza slices about to be thrown out. I leaned my back against the wall and removed my black cloth mask with Massachusetts outlined in white. I left the mask hanging on my left ear as I took a slow gulp of vitamin water. Then I put my mask back on, washed my hands, and headed to the store’s back room where all the cleaning chemicals were kept.

Diego greeted me with a smile and provided me with freshly filled cleaning bottles, paper towels, and a black cart. Then we began making our rounds. We cleaned the tables in the break room, locker handles, door handles, handles on the refrigerator doors by each register, and finally, we sanitized the shopping carts by spraying them, since there were so many and it would have taken too long to wipe down every cart handle. Each round took about a half hour. Rinse and repeat.

Diego was a 19 year old kid with brown skin and a shaved head. He was short and broad. We chatted about our lives and things we liked. He spoke really fast, kept switching topics, and had a lot of energy. Soon, it was close to when Diego needed to leave for the day.

“I only work part time and my mom is picking me up soon.” He paused. “I can’t work full time or drive because my brain doesn’t work right.”

I stopped spraying the carts sitting in the return area outside the store, wondering if I should tell him that my brain doesn’t work right either. But I struggle with moments where I could be vulnerable and connect with people in an authentic way. I often want to say something, but I can’t for whatever reason.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“It’s okay,” Diego said. Then he smiled again and was onto the next topic. We worked side by side until his mother picked him up.