Since I moved to Durham in 1981 I’ve had to change grocery stores about every five years. First there was the A&P that used to be where Whole Foods is located on Broad Street near East Campus. We shopped there because the prices were low, just right for a starving grad student and his family. But The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company closed that store, forcing our humble family to begin shopping at the Winn-Dixie at Northgate, situated roughly about where Hecht’s is located now.

Then that store was torn down during one of the mall’s renovations so we moved to the Harris-Teeter in the new strip mall on the other side of Northgate, which became my favorite store of them all. Good, friendly staff, great location, good prices. But, then THEY closed their doors a couple of years ago and sent all our favorite check-out folks to the store at Willowdaile Shopping Center at Guess and Horton Roads.

The promise was that there would be a new and shiny Harris-Teeter on the site of what used to be the Willowdaile Cinemas. But that never appeared, sending us into a maddening cycle of grocery store hopscotch. One week we’ll go to the Harris Teeter at Willowdaile, then the one near South Square. Another week we’ll go to the Kroger near Home Depot. Then the Food Lion on Hillsborough, or the Kroger on Hillsborough.

Now I learn from the ubiquitous Kevin Davis that there is work being done on the Willowdaile Cinema site and that the modern Harris-Teeter might soon be under construction. I hope so. I need some grocery store stability.