Lots 'o people love Trader Joe's. But not like Nico Lang

Millions of people love Trader Joe's. I wrote a whole book about how that happened. But Nico Lang -- whose work often appears on Chicago's NPR mega-station WBEZ -- has taken TJ's love to a new level, pledging to marry Trader Joe's.

I don't know whether Nico wants to marry the entire chain, or just one Chicago store. Or, if Illinois approves gay marriage, maybe he'll marry Joe Coulombe (though I doubt the original 'Joe' is up for it.)

In a long post on the well-written Thought Catalog blog, Lang rhapsodizes about the marriageability of Trader Joe's, comparing it favorably to such presumably marriage-worthy stars as Ryan Gosling and George Clooney.

Nico's essay may be tongue-in-cheek, but it's interesting to me that he makes a couple of points that I made in my book. (I'm not saying he listened to my interview on WBEZ, but he might have...)

You might think that we’re in the honeymoon period and that I can’t see your flaws, but I accept you — for whatever you throw my way. Is that price not correctly marked? Is the food not always as healthy and organic as it appears? You think that I just see food that tastes good and don’t think about the politics behind it? I know why I have to travel from my “diverse” neighborhood a half an hour by bus to get to you, and why you only seem to be located in “white” neighborhoods. I understand food deserts. I know what your deal is.

I’m ready for a real relationship with you, which means calling you on your bullshit and knowing that your parents (or society) made you this way. They screwed you up, but we get better when we help each other. I see the good in you and know that sometimes instead of throwing the food that has “gone bad” away, you donate it or leave your dumpsters open for garbage pickers to reduce your food waste. You’ve got some baggage, but you’re also a force for good in the world. You care.

What fascinates me still, is that Trader Joe's fans cut the chain so much slack, in exactly the way that we excuse flaws in our friends that we'd find totally irritating in strangers. When he says, "Is the food not always as healthy and organic as it appears? You think that I just see food that tastes good and don’t think about the politics behind it?" it's as if he's been reading this blog.

Nico has an idealist's view of marriage as something you work on. "Is the food not always as healthy and organic as it appears? You think that I just see food that tastes good and don’t think about the politics behind it?" The implication is, of course, that Trader Joe's will actually listen.

"We have to talk" is not something that Trader Joe's famously close-mouthed senior management is ever going to respond to...