Today I was shamed by the Whole Foods checkout clerk, and I spent the remainder of the day with my head held low, feeling like a complete failure as a human – like a hater of our planet who didn’t deserve to live. Allow me to explain.

I love the hot bar at Whole Foods. If I could eat one lunch every day of my life, and price and proximity were no issue, it would hands-down be a plate from the hot bar at Whole Foods. Not only does it offer an array of healthy foods such as steamed kale and broccoli, but the rabbit food actually has flavor. They offer ethnic foods I would never dream of preparing myself, or even ordering at a restaurant, but because it’s on the hot bar, I can sample to see if I like it. I can even get my kid to try all kinds of weird stuff because the whole hot bar idea is so compelling (and it doesn’t hurt that someone else prepared it).

So today, I happen to be downtown for an appointment and had run fresh out of boxes of frozen crap back at the office, so I drove a bit out of my way (though I tried to justify that it was SOMEwhat on my way back), fought traffic on the most notorious stretch in Nashville, wrestled with parking garage parking and made a beeline for the hot bar. I filled my plate with dill cod, vegan collard greens, garlic steamed kale, Moroccan chicken and some unpronounceable side dishes.

Now mind you, there are only two Whole Foods in town, and this one is the least desirable because it is located in the more swanky and congested part of town, and allows for two types of people – rich and pampered ladies who lunch and cool and earthy hippies. I am neither of these things, so I already feel self-conscious in the place. But again, the hot bar is so fabulous that I am willing to put up with just about anything to get to it. Also, this is the ONLY time I get vegetables outside of sugar snap peas on a crudité tray at my neighbor’s house.

Outside of the hot bar, there is only one other item I get at Whole Foods – their store brand of dark chocolate covered pretzels. Fresh market has them – not near as good and sometimes stale. Trader Joe’s has them – a decent backup in a pinch, but again, not the flavor I prefer. Dark chocolate pretzels have yet to make their way to Kroger, Publix or Walmart that I have been able to discover. But Goldilocks tried the Whole Foods pretzels and they were just right. I allow myself one luxury and it happens to be dark chocolate pretzels so don’t judge me, OK? Our normal groceries come from supermarkets like Walmart so I don’t want you to think we’re the rich hoity-toity types who do all our shopping in Whole Foods. Far from it. I’m not above looking for coupons and promo codes wherever I can find them. In fact, this site has proved to be a valuable resource for just that – https://www.raise.com/coupons/walmart. Discounts can make a big difference to your weekly spending and really help you stretch your budget.

So on my way to the register, I grabbed two bags of the dark chocolate pretzels. Now, I’m already in trouble with the hippy checkout clerk because I have forgotten my reusable bag, but she’s willing to part with one precious environmentally crushing brown bag. Then it dawned on me – that fabulous “hot” food was going to melt the pretzels at the bottoms of my elusive chocolate pretzel bags which I so rarely get because I don’t even do the grocery shopping in my family, much less am I ever in the near vicinity of a Whole Foods to obtain my beloved dark chocolate covered pretzels.

This is when I made the crucial error of asking for a separate bag for the pretzels.

I was given a look of complete disgust accompanied by an irritated sigh – hence, my shame.

I trudged back to my car, head hung low, drove back to the office, plopped down at my desk, consumed my lukewarm food, and finished it off with a handful of the pretzels I hadn’t had in months. I asked myself, “Was it really worth all that?”

Absolutely. Because I like what I like, and I’m even willing to be shamed for it.