I was straightening some special diet bread on the freezer shelves. I had the freezer door locked open while I was working and a boy–probably about 3 or 4–started drawing on the frosted glass with his finger. I didn’t notice him until he said, “Look!” He pointed at a big square on the glass and said, “It’s a square!” I told him it was a really cool square, then looked around for a parent. I didn’t see one. The boy had dark brown hair with bangs that nearly reached his eyes. His eyes were brown with dark bags under them.
He wiped the square away and started drawing again as I kept straightening the Ezekial 4:9 Bread and gluten free hamburger buns. He drew a rectangle. When I looked at it he said, “It’s a rectangle!” I told him it was a really great rectangle. He wiped it away and sat down on the floor.
I was done straightening the shelves, but left the door open so he could keep drawing. I expected a parent to get him soon. The boy said, “It’s smoke!” So I looked at his picture. He was pointing at some curly lines he had drawn emerging from a rectangle.
“It’s a choo-choo!”
“Awesome!”
Then he stood up and drew a line on the door.
“What letter is this?” he asked. He added a dot over it.
“An i!”
“What letter is this?”
“An L!”
A woman came by and told him to leave the girl alone. I told him I had to close the door now. He wiped away the L and left without saying anything.
This is from the newspaper in my hometown in Missouri. I love the way this woman is not smiling in front of a picture of her not smiling. The newspaper really couldn’t have captured the honor in a more succinct way.
I typed the word “what” into Google. Some of the results were things I had actually googled recently. Some were not. I’ll let you decide which are mine.
On Wednesday, I was waiting at a bus stop when a homeless man said to me, “Do you know that song “Gloomy Sunday” by Billie Holiday? It reminds me of Seattle.”
He was probably in his 60s with a white beard, a blue stocking cap, and a ragged wrist cast sticking out from his coat sleeve. He sat down on the bench next to me and talked about a lot of things. In the middle of several of his explanations he’d either take a sip of the beer he had in a plastic bag, burp, or say, “Did I tell you about that?” My half of the conversation consisted mostly of nods, yesses, and nos.
He told me about how he traveled to Portugal and how the uncultivated land was beautiful and full of wildflowers. Then he told me about Israel. There are no smiles in Israel. He says people are surprised about that–that there are no smiles in the middle of Bible land.
He thinks it’s strange how so many people live in Seattle but don’t know much of the history, beyond the history that is profitable. He told me about how Saint Cabrini built Sacred Heart Orphanage.
He doesn’t like going to Seattle bars. They give him bad vibrations, which is something he just doesn’t need.
At work today, a woman yelled at me because a sale we’re having on cereal was not advertised in the store flier. The sale ends tonight. She was furious that she had no way of knowing the cereal was on sale unless she came to the store and saw it (WHICH SHE DID).
I don’t understand this kind of anger. IT’S CEREAL. Plus, I tend to think that it’s awesome when I stumble on a great sale on its last day. I cheer when that happens; I don’t act as if someone put a box of cereal up my ass and forgot to tell me about it until I happened to stumble upon it on its last day of being in my ass.
Thank you for playing this song every night during my shift so that I can wake up with it in my head. Thanks also for playing the Bee Gees at least three times and “Dancing Queen” by ABBA at least once a night too. Making sure the canned beans are properly stacked on the shelves is quite pleasurable with such a soundtrack. Thank you for your kindness.
For the last few days I’ve been observing the behavior of one of my co-workers.
At my grocery store job, we have to wear safety shoes. After work, this particular co-worker changes his shoes. That’s not too weird.
He takes off his shoes and socks and puts on a pair of extremely tattered slip ons. I can see half of his left foot when he’s wearing the shoes. Once we’re outside, he takes off his shoes, crosses the road, and sprints about two blocks before he turns the corner and disappears from view.
Today my apartment building is having some maintenance performed on all the radiators in all the apartments. It started at 8:30am. They haven’t been into my apartment yet, even though I actually got dressed for them. I didn’t shower–but I at least got out of my polka-dotted pajama pants. When I don’t work until 2:15 in the afternoon, being dressed so early is particularly rare.
Anyway, I hate these days. What I hate more is that the bathroom is the first room you pass upon entering my apartment and I’m pretty sure that as soon as I decide to go to the bathroom they’re going to knock on the door. OR! They are going to know exactly what I was doing before they got here.
One time, at my old apartment, I had a new refrigerator delivered. I had just gone to the bathroom when the fridge guys showed up. They came into the apartment to see how they’d have to maneuver the thing and then went back outside to get the fridge. While they were gone, I furiously sprayed some air freshener (seriously, does this ever even work?) and opened up a window. But they knew.
It’s not that it matters that much. It’s just that if I had that job, I wouldn’t be able to resist saying to my co-worker, “That girl just took a huge dump!” as I was leaving the building.
