I’m not just a “glass half-full” guy.  I’m a glass 3/4 full guy.

I tune out the chatter of all the ills and downfalls of my small town, my state, and the USA.  Look for the good and you will find it.  If you can’t find it, look harder.  Or better yet, just set out to make some small part of your world a little better each day.  Find the bright side.  Yeah, that sounds good.

And then I wake up in a strange town in desperate need of donuts, night crawlers, and chicken livers.  Without knowing where to turn for these three key items, I have a lapse in judgement and ask Siri those words that don’t seem natural to me, “driving directions to Walmart”.  I don’t do Walmart when I’m at home, but that’s another story for another day.

This is an early morning trip, designed to miss the first of the month mayhem.  I arrived in a good mood, happy to be away from a stressful job, free to spend a relaxing day of fishing with my family.  I drove away minutes later, convinced that our country is in complete and hopeless decay.

I suppose our view of the world depends on which part of the world we’re looking at, who we spend our time with, and what types of media we allow to invade our brain.  For those who work at Walmart, you have my sympathy.  Unconsciously, I have sheltered myself daily from a large segment of people.

As a teen, during the “rock music will send you to hell” era, I used to tell people that people didn’t turn to the ways of evil because they listened to heavy metal, but for those that were heavy into evil……heavy metal would obviously be the music of choice.  So I’m not saying that everybody that shops at Walmart is lazy.  But if you are lazy, then you wouldn’t dream of shopping anywhere else.

It’s an absolute haven for people who come from the school of thought that preaches doing as little as humanly possible and the greatest theme for life in general,

“Somebody else will get it.”

The store wasn’t very full at this particular time of morning.  I was amazed at the number of motorized shopping carts in use, not because they were needed by most……..just because they were so convenient and so dang available at this early hour.

Impaired lady in checkout line ramming her cart against the counter, causing the cashier a momentary panic……check.

Lady with a half-dressed infant slung uncomfortably in the bread basket of the shopping cart……check.

And the greatest scene of all came in the parking lot.  47 shopping carts.  Seven in cart corrals.  Forty running wild.  Forty people put their purchases in their car and listened to that voice in their head,

“Somebody else will get it.”

Too lazy to walk 15 feet to do the right thing.  Fifteen feet away from freeing up parking spaces and reducing the grave danger of runaway shopping carts.  But it’s too much to take on.  I’ll just get in my car and leave it there for someone else to deal with.

So I get judgy.  I go ahead and assume, that of those 40 cart leavers, zero have had a job and done it well.  If they do have a job, I bet they live in total fear of doing too much or doing more than their share (I’m sure they have nothing to fear).  I bet they talk quite a bit about what’s fair.  I bet they talk a lot about what they think the government should be doing for them.  I bet some have never worked, never tried, and never intend to.  I bet they’re too lazy to raise their kids right.

A real Sherlock Holmes.  Amazing what a guy can deduct from a few scattered carts on a Walmart parking lot.

But what if every cart was left by a 90 year-old WWII vet or a single mother with four kids under the age of 5? What if they were struggling and I didn’t even notice? Didn’t offer to lend a hand.

Maybe the guy with the 3/4 full cup needs to look past the empty buggies and silly judgemental assumptions.

Find a greater, God honoring purpose.  Count blessings.  If my cup is overflowing, I need to ignore the objects and distractions and open my eyes to the people around me.  Fill someone else’s cup.  Make some part of the world better even if that part happens to be a Walmart parking lot.  It’s not about the place.  It’s about the people.

But Walmart still sucks.