Photo Essay: Fresh Market Foods. Provo

I love wandering through grocery stores, especially on a Sunday morning when the aisles are either ghostly clear or cluttered with new inventory. I find it easy to celebrate God's bounty in a supermarket.

The shopping cart was invented by Sylvan Goldman for his Oklahoma City Piggly Wiggly customers in 1937.

Their onsite bakery uses only prepackaged and premeasured ingredients, I know; but for a guy without a car like me it means warm bread and fresh donuts every day. The store is a block from my apartment.

Not an endorsement, but I'm a sucker for these gut shots. They remind me of the pickle juice I used to drink straight out of the jar from my mother's refrigerator -- it would drive her crazy to find half a dozen pickles in dry dock because I'd drained all the juice.

A vista of endless abundance -- to me just as magnificent as a panoramic view of the Grand Canyon

Yet even in paradise there are pitfalls for the unwary

I bought pork chops from the quick sale pile once. I'll never do it again. 

 Must be time for their Swimsuit issue

The faceless taking of my money -- another blessing of modern technology

Margie has worked at Fresh Market for six years. She likes the early morning shift, cuz the customers are all regulars and the store is quiet. But she wishes she didn't have to work Sunday mornings.

A box of tortilla chip bags

A parking lot on Sunday morning is a lonesome place

At the back of the store they crush cardboard boxes together, to ship to recycling plants in China

"A very important aspect of properly observing the Sabbath concerns shopping on Sunday. Unfortunately, many commercial businesses and establishments are open on Sunday. The world sees no conflict in Sunday shopping. But we of the Church have been counseled and taught by prophets to keep ourselves “unspotted from the world.” We should not shop on Sunday."    

Earl C. Tingey