I was caught at the light at the bottom of the hill, readying a turn and wondering if the guy to my right was going plow into my lane, sweep around or head through the gates of the chemical factory in front of us.

On a lunch break I’d gone to South Charleston to buy Vietnamese hot sauce and sticky rice at the local Asian market. I thought I might also look at the beer aisle of the nearby Kroger. My regular place to get cheap, “craft-like” beer had recently gone under and already I was complaining about the selection at the Kroger in my neck of the woods –the Kroger we sometimes referred to as “Hillbilly Kroger.”

Hillbilly Kroger is great if you’re looking for good deals on things the upscale Kroger stores carry. During the year I spent living as a vegan, it was my go-to for wildly expensive meat substitutes and chemically suspect, dairy-free ice cream. The store carries beer, but it’s all the swill I thought was the “good stuff” when I was in college (Budweiser, Busch and Coors).

My tastes haven’t necessarily evolved, but they’re more expensive and suit a particular aesthetic.

I lean toward syrupy stouts and porters that taste a little like coffee or chocolate and tend to have two or three times the alcohol of your average Bud Light.

A friend calls the blackout juice, which isn’t completely accurate. Typically, these are more like “Bad Decision Beers.”

There will be no further explanation about what has happened after I’ve had a few of these after a bad day or a sad day, except to say, mistakes have been made.

Anyway, I was in South Charleston to shop, to reconnoiter and maybe grab a bite to eat on the way back.

I caught the light at the beginning, sighed and sat there, looking up at my rearview mirror.

Behind me in a car too small for the two of them sat a reasonably unattractive couple.

Beauty is subjective, to be sure. So, the opposite must be true.

I think can be a little cruel here because everyone in this scene is anonymous. and because they reminded me of me. There are pictures to prove this. Many pictures.

But the driver was a sweaty, fat gnome of a man with a pocket lint beard. His hair was dark, greasy and shaggy.

If not for the clarity in his eyes, I’d have thought he just crawled out of bed, but I’d still have bet a paycheck he was wearing lounge pants and probably crocs.

I remember the age. He had the day off and when you’re a young twenty-something with nowhere in particular to be, you dress like a toddler.

He hadn’t had a shower since before the start of his last shift.

His passenger was his match, about the same age, pale and oily, with long hair the color of overcooked pasta. She outweighed him by 20 or 30 pounds and was eating something from a paper cup with a spoon.

I watched them chat away. The man nodded his head, smiling, while the women talked. On every third bite, she carefully fed him from her cup.

I didn’t see him ask for her food or register either expectation or surprise on his face as she fed him.

It was a simple gesture of sharing while the car was stopped. It was a tiny, intimate action among lovers. She didn’t want him to miss out on something. He was enjoying being taken care of in this little way.

As the light went from red to green and I made my turn, it occurred to me that they were happy. I envied them. They might’ve had the whole day ahead of them.

Meanwhile, I was just a moody man burning his lunch break in search of flavor and joy for a life that sometimes feels flat.