posted on February 16, 2009 07:35:34 PM new
Last week, I made a quick stop at the grocery store for laundry detergent. As luck would have it, I was stuck behind a couple with a full grocery cart. The man, closest to me, appeared to be a 60-ish slob, close to 250 (if not 300 pounds) in an old sweatshirt and sweat pants. That's OK- I don't dress up for the grocery either. The woman (I only saw her initially from the back) appeared to be an aging "working girl". Jet-black straight hair down to her a#s, large waist in a mini-skirt with dark stockings and 5" heels in calf-high boots. I zoned out until the clerk asked me- "Can you believe it? She's his MOTHER!- My God, she looks FANTASTIC"! At this point, "working-girl-Mom" turns to me - Deeply wrinkled face, large jowls, large nose. She was heavily made up- brightly painted lips, must-be 3 inch eyelashes. I did quick math and figured she must be at least 80 - or 75 if a precocious teen. I stuttered "I can't believe it.."
Since then, I've had 2 lucid dreams where this woman played a prominent part. Why does she disturb me so much? How can I wipe this vision from memory?
posted on February 16, 2009 08:56:57 PM new
No advice for you pixiamom, but i love grocery store vignettes! I've seriously considered starting a blog about my monthly trips to the store. There's always at least one story worth recounting when you stand in line.
One day about a month ago I was in town at the mega lowmart buying a month's worth of beer after picking up a trailer full of feed and shooting the breeze at the feed store too long. It was late, and I had a 35 mile drive home, almost 20 of it on dirt to look forward to. There was a kid about 20 ahead of me who had a big bale of toilet paper, one of those 24 roll packs. That's all he had. Nice looking kid, well dressed. He was trying to pay for it with a counter check. You know, the kind without an imprinted name and address. The clerk wasn't having any of it, so the kid pulled out a debit or credit card that wouldn't work. At this point, the kid is not only fidgeting but so am I. The clerk calls the beady-eyed night manager over. This weasel starts to scrutinize the check, the credit card, the kid and begins asking him all kinds of inane questions. "Where do you work? How come you don't have checks with your address on them? Why doesn't this card work?" and I don't remember what else. After a full 10 minutes of this I'd had enough. "For god's sake" I said, "This kid obviously has urgent business and if he was trying to rip you off don't you think he'd at least have a good bottle of whiskey or something? Put the buttwipe on my bill and GET ME OUT OF HERE!!!"
The manager looked at me like a fish looking at a bicycle. Incredulous. He couldn't believe I'd spring the 8 bucks or whatever it was just to get this poor kid out the door. The kid, to his credit, literally followed me out to my truck, thanking me over and over with some goofy story about his girlfriend being sick.
A trip to the store is a little slice of humanity if you've got time to watch.
posted on February 16, 2009 08:59:33 PM new
SWMBO just reminded me that this happened months or years ago, not last month, and that I had a trailer full of fence wire, not feed. Oh well.....
posted on February 16, 2009 11:18:13 PM new
Here in our little mountain town we have a number of widowers, many of whom are what I call codger-geezers. They're really lonely, I know, and boy do they want to talk to a woman! I talk as long as I have time for, then make my excuses and walk to the car. I feel sorry for them; they seem so lost.
Profe: On occasion I've paid part or all of a (small) sale someone ahead of me has had trouble with. It's part of just being human, isn't it!
Pixi: Your encounter with that woman sounds like something Patricia A. on The Medium would be dreaming about. Very strange. It must have made a huge impression on you, to cause you to dream about it.
_____________________
"Here in America we are descended in blood and in spirit from revolutionists and rebels - men and women who ***dared to dissent*** from accepted doctrine. As their heirs, ***may we never confuse honest dissent with disloyal subversion."*** --Eisenhower
posted on February 17, 2009 05:36:59 AM new
All I can say is bless her heart for even attempting to wear heels! I'm 53 and can't wear anything higher than 3". Even then they have to have a bit of a platform or my feet will ache all day! Bless her heart for even dressing up to go to the grocery store! Most days I can't even manage to get out the mascara let alone false eyelashes. LOL! Thankfully, it takes all kinds to make the world go round and what a boring world it would be if we were all the same.
posted on February 17, 2009 06:29:22 AM new
You are so right, Cheryl. We need to delve a little beyond the superficial to really appreciate and understand people.
Our local grocery store employs mentally retarded people to help with bagging groceries and other jobs that they can handle. Generally, they do a superior job. But one of those employees is becoming mentally disturbed...increasingly angry and combative. She focuses most of her angry tirades against the manager who avoids responding. If he is not there, she gossips loudly about him to the checkers who also ignore her. Recently, in order to avoid her disturbance inside the store she has the job of returning shopping carts from the parking lot to the store. I believe that my last sighting of her was yesterday when she was raising hell with the shopping carts.
Pixia, Freud might suggest that the superficial characteristics of the couple that you dream about represent something that you fear or wish to eliminate.
posted on February 17, 2009 06:44:34 AM new
LOL, Helen! Our local Target also employees the mentally handicapped. I have found most of them to be the kindest and most helpful of all Target's employees.
posted on February 17, 2009 08:47:33 PM new
Pixi, most of us spend our whole adult lives trying to make up for the things we didn't get as children. Flashy, shocking people tend to have had difficult childhoods that lacked attention. I've seen people that I'd love to take home and clean up. They probably feel the same way when they see me.
posted on February 18, 2009 05:30:23 AM new "Pixi, most of us spend our whole adult lives trying to make up for the things we didn't get as children. Flashy, shocking people tend to have had difficult childhoods that lacked attention. I've seen people that I'd love to take home and clean up. They probably feel the same way when they see me."
KD, you are so beautiful that you could pop little pixia's peepers right out of their sockets without any makeup or high heeled boots. Hopefully some day you will meet her in line at the grocery store.
