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I just got burned
at Whole Food. No, I mean really burned. I was unloading my groceries
onto the checkout counter and as I reached in my wallet for my credit card, I
noticed a white residue on my fingertips. I know how that sounds, but it wasn’t
that. It looked like my fingertips had been dipped in white paint, and as I
held my fingers up to look closer, the white began to spread into splotches and
started to sting.
I was very confused
by this and just stood there with my mouth agape looking at my fingers and
watching the white splotches spread, and then the stinging intensified and I
suddenly thought something really weird was about to happen, that my whole body
would spontaneously break out in white splotches and start burning all over ... And then I thought, “Anthrax!” My mind went from zero to panic in two seconds
flat. I held my hand out for the cashier, who by now was looking at me askance,
and said, a bit wimpily, “There’s something on my fingers!” and she nodded,
kind of, “Yeah sure whatever,” but I insisted, “This is really weird, it’s
really stinging,” so she handed me her hand sanitizer, which I rubbed on but it just stung more. So I asked if there was a ladies room and she escorted
me way to the back of the store—walking a little casually, if you ask me—as I
trotted behind convinced that my skin was about to blister and fall off like the Incredible Melting Man and then what would I do?
We finally go back there and, hey, not too glamorous where the poor Whole Foods employees have to go to seek relief. Clean, but cheerlessly industrial, and only two loos. Naturally, both were occupied, so I headed for a huge sink and rinsed the hell out of my hand in cold water, and the stinging stopped. But the chalky white residue remained. Then it dawned on me that this was the kind of reaction peroxide has on the skin—I’ve bleached my own hair enough times, it’s happened. But this was seriously out of context in the Palace of All Natural and Organic, I must say.
A
very nice girl who was back there arranging batches lovely Whole Foods flowers (in a sad, grey little room, bless her) called a floor manager and they both helpfully produced
burn-relief items from a first aid kit. The manager was seriously puzzled
by the idea that anything in the store could possibly burn a person, but still,
he donned rubber gloves and searched through my bags to see if he could find
anything untoward. He didn’t. He took my name and number, gave me his and
advised me to go to the D*O*C*S nearby, where they have an account, to have it
checked out, which I did—just in case I did suddenly self-combust later on, I
wanted it to be on record. The guy at the reception thought it looked like an
acid burn. Eek!
By the time the doctor saw me an hour had passed, my Ionic Awakening frozen pizza had defrosted, and 90 percent of the white whatever had disappeared. But there was still enough left for her to deliver the prognosis that it was, indeed, a reaction to peroxide.
Sure enough, when I unpacked the groceries at home, white splotches reappeared on my hand, and disappeared again shortly after I rinsed it. I still don’t know which item or items are drenched in peroxide, and I’m a little nervous about eating anything I’ve bought today. Which is not how you’re supposed to feel after shopping at Whole Foods, now are you?
