#13 - What’s Love Got to Do with It?, Part 3

So there I am, standing next to my rumbling car, trying to figure out what I’m going to do, now that I’ve locked my keys inside the running car. And this is a Mustang Mach II, a muscle-car wannabe that does not purr quietly. The chugging of the engine is meant to attract attention. You can’t help but notice the noise. Drunks at the blood bank across the street are fully aware that the engine is alive.

Which means that everybody in the parking lot is aware of my situation, within seconds, as I stand beside the car with a panicked expression on my face and yanking on a door that will not budge. It’s morning rush hour, so there are tons of looky-loos milling about, and of course one of them has to ask something idiotic.

“Did you lock your keys in that thing?”

No, I just want to steal this car, but I’m not as smart as you and I don’t know how to do it. Perhaps you could give me some pointers since, based on your appearance with the stained overalls and the chewing tobacco juice dribbling off your chin, you probably know some folks with some helpful tips. Then I take a deep breath and calm down. It’s not this guy’s fault. I need to quit being such a bitter, sarcastic drama queen, even if I don’t know how to act any other way.

“Yeah, I guess I did. Pretty dumb-ass on my part.”

He sidles up a little closer, quite pleased to find himself engaged in an actual conversation, since he’s used to people just running the other way. (See, I can’t help myself, the sarcasm just oozes,) “Well, get you one of them hangers.”

Hangers? Hangers! Yes, a wire hanger, so I can snake it through the window seal and try to pull up the lock knob. “Great idea. Be right back. Can you keep an eye on this for me?” He immediately beams at the prospect of this new mission, hooking his thumbs under the straps of the overalls and looking around to see who has noticed that he has important things to do with HIS life.

So I race back into the store. The manager looks at me with a quizzical expression. “I thought you were gone.”

“Thought I was, too.” Then I zip right past him without further explanation, headed toward the back room. I don’t want to talk to him at all. He’s a boring man, with boring things to say. He’ll only slow me down.

I crash through the swinging doors in the rear of the store, and nearly slam into the bread truck guy as he waddles out of the bathroom, still pulling up his pants and fiddling with his belt. Very nice. He was raised GOOD. Of course, he probably didn’t expect Jessie Owens to sprint by as he was coming out of the bathroom, but still, finish your business before you open the bathroom door. It’s just the right thing to do, okay?

Side note: The just-vacated bathroom is a major point of contention in this store. See, the manager does not want the rest of us to let the public use our private restroom. And I completely agree with that, all for it, don’t wanna clean up after these nasty people anyway Trouble is, on HIS shift, he lets anybody and their dog use this bathroom, waving hordes of people on through.

Which leads to complications on the rest of the shifts. When I tell drunken people that we don’t have a public bathroom, they want to argue with me, because they just peed in said bathroom a few hours ago with the complete blessing of the other guy, the MANAGER guy. You’re not the manager.

Look, you smelly little heathen with your ugly girlfriend, I’m the manager RIGHT NOW. And you’re not going back there.

Then you need to call the real manager. He’ll tell you I can go back there.

No, you need to just leave and go pee where you normally pee. You must live somewhere nearby, because you’re always in here trying to get a deal on the day-old fried pies.

And so it would go. Every night, at some point, there would be a discussion on who has the right to pee where. But I wouldn’t give in. I didn’t want these people in the bathroom. If I can’t see you, I don’t know what you’re doing, and in this part of town, visual contact is important to survival. For God’s sake, some of you folks will steal the Godzilla stick just because it’s not bolted down.

But of course, I did let a select few make use of the facilities. Justine, for one, was welcome to LIVE in the bathroom if she indicated an interest in doing so. For the most part, though, I was the ass that made you hold it until you got home.

Anyway, back to the quest for a wire hanger, I side-stepped around bread truck guy and sped to the little section where we keep our personal things. There was a tiny closet where we could hang things up, so I ripped open the door with a rush of excitement.

All of the hangers I could see were plastic. Great.

Just then, I heard the manager guy bang through the swinging doors. Terrific. I did NOT want to talk to him, I’d already lost enough hours of my life as he babbled on about meaningless things like bait, fertilizer and whether or not corn meal would take the sting out of poison ivy.

Luckily, the manager stopped to chat with the bread guy, who was still fiddling with his belt buckle. (Come ON, Einstein, you put the prong in the hole. How do you manage to drive a truck? Or tie your shoes?) Einstein was a talker, too, so they immediately launched into a lengthy discussion on the mating habits of the hoot owl or some such.

Just as I was about to forlornly close the closet door, I spotted a discarded wire hanger on the floor of the cubicle, shoved to the back. It was old and rusty, and was covered in that thin, crackly paper they used to be wrapped in way back in the day, advertising some dry cleaning establishment that probably burned to the ground twenty years ago. But it would work. I snatched it up and reversed my course.

I tried to avoid eye contact with the manager as he continued to chat with Dough Boy, but I guess he caught the flash of my team smock as I sped by. “Brian?”

I kept moving. “What?”

“What are you doing?”

I slammed through the swinging doors, startling an elderly woman clutching a honey bun. “Nothing. I’ll tell you in a minute.” Translation: “I have no intention of coming back in this store. Leave me alone.”

I got back outside, where Festus was still lording over the rumbling car, grinning broadly at anybody who happened to glance in his direction. (“I’m in charge!”) Then he noticed me, and the smile faded and he snapped into what he assumed was a military-like position. He was taking this far too seriously.

I ripped the wrapper off the hanger, and started twisting the curved part to unwind the two ends of the wire. This is difficult to do when you’re trying to hurry and get it done before talkative people come outside for further investigation.

Festus: “Son, I think that you-”

Me: “Just a second. Almost got it.”

Festus: “But the lock-”

Me: “Hang on. A couple more twists…” And then the ends were free. I straightened the thing out, and made a little hook on one end. I jiggled it through the top of the window and snaked the metal toward the lock. Wait a minute. Aw hell.

Festus: “Ain’t nothing to hook it on. I was tryin to tell you.”

Sigh. I’d forgotten that the top of the lock button was smooth as anything, just this little piston thing that basically disappeared into the hole when it was pushed down. This little operation was not going to go anywhere. I pulled the wire back out and threw it on the ground in frustration.

Festus: “Ain’t the hanger’s fault.”

I suddenly wanted farmer man to go do something else for a while. Thanks for the guard duty, please continue on your way to the cattle show or wherever you were headed. Say “hey” to the missus for me. I’m assuming her name is not Elsie.

But Festus was determined to assist. There hadn’t been this much excitement in his life since Billy Ray Bodean got lickered up at the barn dance and showed his tackle. “Who else has got a key? Somebody close?”

And again, I’m making fun of the yokel but he’s the one with the good ideas. Really need to work on that sarcastic thing and start listening to people.

But wait. The only other person who has a key is Dad. Oh boy. That was a phone call I did NOT want to make unless my life depended on it. And even then, there would be hesitation. Call Dad, or ascend to the pearly gates? I’d really have to think on that one.

You see, Dad had convinced himself long ago that I would never amount to anything. Which wasn’t true. I got along fairly decently and I paid my bills on time. But every once in a while I would do something completely dumb-ass, and of course he would find out, and then he’d put another notch in his lipstick case.

I sighed again. “Well, I guess I could call my dad.”

Festus: “He gotta key?”

Me: “Yeah. And an attitude.” (Like I didn’t have one. Tree, apple, not far, right?)

Festus: “Daddies always have attitudes. That’s why they’re daddies.”

I was beginning to really like this man in the overalls. Maybe he could adopt me?

Festus: “Well, son, I gotta head out. You sure you can find your daddy?”

Me: “Yeah. Just gotta make a few calls.”

Festus: “Good enough for gov’ment work. I’ll see ya.” Then he turned and headed toward his beat-up pickup.

Me, calling after him: “Hey, thanks a lot. I appreciate it.”

He just raised an arm and did a half-wave in the air, then kept walking.

I watched him go for a bit, then turned back to the store. I would have to go inside to use the phone (no cell phones in 1986), meaning I would probably have to actually speak to the manager this time. Great. Two people I didn’t want to talk to, all lined up and ready to torment me.

I walked in the front door.

Manager: “Is that YOUR car that we can hear? Why are you just letting that thing run? And why aren’t you leaving? Why is that hanger on the ground? Didn‘t you detail the parking lot last night?”

Sigh. “I locked my keys in the car. And yes, while it was running.”

Manager: “That’s pretty stupid.”

Ya think?

I elbowed my way past him and picked up the phone. Dad worked for the phone company, and was usually out in the field, installing lines in houses while bored housewives flirted with him. So I got transferred around until somebody figured out the right Dispatch center, then finally the man himself was on the line.

I told my sad tale.

Silence on the line. Then: “Why did you do that?”

I gritted my teeth. This is what I’m talking about. I didn’t do this on purpose. It was an accident. Why does this man not understand accidents? “Can you help me out. Are you anywhere near here?”

Silence on the line. Then: “No. But I’ll be there in thirty minutes.” Click.

So I sat on the curb in the parking lot, chain-smoking and avoiding the inside of the store where co-workers asked too many questions. Eventually Dad pulls up in his rig, hands me the spare key, then stands there and observes to make sure I understand how to insert the key and turn the lock. I’m in.

Dad: “Go to the auto store, make a copy of the key, and get one of those little plastic boxes with the magnet on the back. Stick it on an axle.”

Then he’s gone.

I get in the car, drive back to my tiny apartment, break out the beer, and I’m happily buzzed by 11am in the morning. Things are so twisted around when you work the midnight shift. My night is your morning. And yes, I got the stupid key box.

A few nights later, I of course had to share all of this with Justine. She was greatly amused. “I could have popped that lock for you.”

“But it was after your shift. You were probably dead to the world already.”

She took a sip of her coffee. “Would have LOVED to see your dad’s face when he showed up.” And then she cackled and snorted in her earthy way.

“You’re a BAD woman. Evil.”

She was still laughing as she headed out the door and into the night.

I got busy with some of my paperwork. (It was really amazing how much paperwork we had to do. Seriously. We had to notate every time we blinked.) Finishing that up, I took my checkbook out of my front pocket, pulling out a few dollars I had stashed in there to pay for the chocolate milk and sandwich I had consumed earlier (we didn’t get ANYTHING for free, unlike the police officers), rang it up, then decided to put the checkbook in my personal drawer in the back counter because I was tired of the checkbook banging against my leg.

Then, as I paused for a second to consider which of my chores I should tackle next, I noticed that the milk row was empty in the dairy part of the refrigerated section on the back wall. I headed to the walk-in cooler, shoved four containers of milk into the row, and went back to the check-out counter.

My personal drawer was slightly open. Did I not close that all the way?

I pulled the drawer open. My checkbook was gone.

I broke out in a cold sweat. I had stepped away for roughly 30 seconds. What was going on? There had been no time for someone to walk in here, take the checkbook, and get back out the door.

Who was in the store?

And where?

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#12 - What’s Love Got to Do with It?, Part 2

Needless to say, having a gun pointed at me was not one of the more calming and relaxing moments in my life. I’m sure my jaw hit the ground, because the whole scene came out of nowhere and caught me completely off guard. I may have even wet myself a little bit. Not sure.

Anyway, the kid with the gun. Once he saw the look on my face, he threw his head back and laughed. Then he just turned and walked away. Slowly. Like he was just out for a stroll and looking at the stars, might even stop by for an ice cream cone if Braum’s was still open.

I just stood there for a minute, with white noise flooding my brain instead of any useful electrical impulses that might help me process what had just happened. Then I realized I was still clutching the cigarette order in one sweaty hand. I snapped to and threw the damn thing down on the counter. There would be no more counting tonight.

But what should I do now? Do I need to call the police? Surely that was a crime, what just happened. It HAD to be a crime. Nobody should get away with something like that. Then again, this was Oklahoma, and some of these people have an inordinate amount of affection for their handguns. Pointing your gun at someone might not even be a misdemeanor, for all I knew. You might have to actually pull the trigger before you get your hand slapped.

Oddly enough, during the whole encounter, it never once crossed my mind to push the panic button near the cash register. That’s what the button was for, to notify the police if something serious was going down. We are fully schooled on the proper use of this button during training. Robbery? Gang violence? Crazed people with implements of death? Push the damn button!

I didn’t even think of it. Good to know that I had a completely level-head in a time of crisis and followed procedure, yes?

But could I push it now, after the fact and all? Maybe not. It wouldn’t be right for me to occupy some police officers when something much more serious might be going down somewhere else. Part of me was already convinced that the kid was just pissed at me because I wouldn’t sell him any beer, and all he wanted to do was scare me. (Mission accomplished.) I probably wouldn’t see him again.

Then again, we’re talking about a basically deranged kid who thought it was okay to wave a gun at me in the first place. What ELSE did he think would be okay? What if he’d only disappeared so he could find some of his little friends who also had access to weapons of mass destruction? I picked up the phone.

Just then, headlights bounced across the front of the store as a squad car pulled into the parking lot. Wow. Did I just make a telepathic 9-1-1 call? If so, I needed to figure out how to make some money off this newfound skill.

The squad car parked right at the front doors, and the headlights blinked off. I could now see that it was Justine, one of the officers who patrolled this area. She liked to get her coffee from our store, probably because I threw on a fresh pot every time I thought about it, unlike the slackers at some of the other stores who would let the coffee simmer down to nothing but black tar.

I patiently waited for Justine to do all her little sign off crap and get out of the car. It was always a mystery to me, this whole process that Justine would go through before exiting the vehicle. She would flip switches and turn dials and fiddle with this and that in a complex array of motions. It would not have surprised if the space shuttle had launched out of her trunk by the time she was done.

She finally wrapped it up, popped open the car door, hauled herself out and sauntered toward the store. (Justine, despite the pretty name, was not the most feminine creature on the planet. She’s one of those people who is fully comfortable with releasing an echoing belch regardless of where she might be.)

Justine opened the front door, took two steps in, glanced at my face, and screeched to a halt. “What happened?”

I was still a little rattled, so I’m sure I came out with something like “This kid… and he… and I didn’t… and the gun… and his tongue…and-”

She held up a hand. “It’s alright. Slow down. I got time. Let me grab some coffee while you start over.”

So Justine moseyed to the coffee area, quietly performing the intricate routine that some serious coffee drinkers have, where everything has to be done in a certain order, while I took a deep breath and babbled away about the beer-less bastard. She would nod every few words to indicate that my signal was being received and that I should keep going.

Then Justine calmly walked back to me at the counter, blew on her coffee, took a very tiny sip, grimaced slightly to indicate that it was still a little too warm, set the cup on the counter, and then looked at me. “He won’t be back. You’re good. But let’s do some paperwork anyway.”

She trotted back out to her car, where she grabbed up a clipboard and a folder and some other official looking things. Then she came back in the store, spread out her materials over one section of the counter, and uncapped a pen. “Tell me everything again.”

So I did. And she kept asking questions and wanting more information, pausing every now and then as I attended to other customers as they came into the store, to the point where I started wondering why she was being so thorough. Then it dawned on me. She was just trying to keep me company, staying with me until I quit worrying about being alone in the store and that jerk coming back.

Eventually, of course, she had to go. I tried to thank her, but of course she blew that off. Just doing her job. “But I’ll check back in later, in case you remember some more details or something.” And check back she did. The woman drank more coffee that shift than one would think is humanly possible.

And she was right. I never saw that kid again.

But I definitely saw more of Justine. Mostly coffee runs. You see, it was an understood policy with Quik Trip that any police officer was welcome to free beverages and, well, basically anything they wanted. It was a discreet thank you, but it also kept them coming in the store, and that’s always a good thing. Especially in the high-risk stores. You WANT officers to just show up with some degree of regularity. I was fully prepared to cook them a five-course meal if necessary

Sadly, Justine had to make quite a few “official” visits as well. That store had a lot of “runners”. These are the folks that just walk in the store, grab whatever they wanted (usually beer) and then run out the door without paying for it. There was a dividing line we had to follow: Less than twenty dollars in merchandise, you could just write it off. Over twenty? It was technically a felony, and you had to make a police report.

It got to the point where Justine always brought her clipboard every time she came in, just in case. Generally, somebody ran every night. There was nothing you could do to stop them, especially if the store was busy.

Well, there was ONE thing you could do. After 11pm, we were allowed to lock one of the double doors at the entrance. I usually locked the door people typically considered the “out” door, so the runners wouldn’t notice this road hazard on the way in.

I have to say, I did find this locked door to be quite entertaining when it came to the runners. There was something very satisfying about it when some stoner would slink in the store, grab two 12-packs of beer, haul ass to the front of the store, and then slam face-first into immovable glass. It was a crunching sound that I greatly enjoyed.

Anyway, Justine and I became buddies. And one of the things that greatly amused her was being able to subtly torture me whenever possible. Her favorite thing to ask me when she made her first appearance on any given evening? “You gotta stick the tanks tonight?”

Ah yes, the sticking of the tanks. As in the huge, underground receptacles that held the fuel that fed the gas pumps. “Sticking the tanks” meant measuring how much gasoline was left. And this was an activity that no one who actually worked in the stores wanted to do. Ever. We hated it.

Remember, it’s 1986. Things just weren’t as high-tech as they are now. In fact, in comparison, some things were pretty primitive. And this, ladies and gentleman, is how one sticks the tanks:

Each store had been furnished with this incredibly long wooden stick, maybe fifteen feet long, with inches marked off all down one side. It was like a yardstick intended for Godzilla. Because this thing was so long, we had to keep it outside. Because our store was in a crappy part of town where people will steal ANYTHING, the stick often went missing.

I actually appreciated thievery when it came to the stick, because it meant I didn’t have to stick the damn tanks until somebody ordered another one, and that was not my job. On the flip side, there was always a tiny moment of sadness when I arrived for work each evening and the stick WAS there, lying along the front of the store, waiting smugly for sticking time.

When you stick a tank, you snatch up Godzilla’s yardstick, hoist it over your should like those poles that high-jumpers use, trudge out to the various tanks, open the access cover, twist open the cap on the tank (and these caps were ALWAYS rusted shut, even if you had just opened them the night before), stand the stick on its end so that it is reaching for the stars, then gently lower the stick into the tank (you can’t just drop it in, because the stick could snap in two, and then you’re screwed).

Once the stick hits the bottom of the tank, you pull the thing back out, locate where on the stick that the wetness stops, find the corresponding inch marker, and note this figure on the official sticking report.

Now, this might sound rather simple, but it’s not. There are a number of factors that can get mixed into the process that can gum things up and cause heartache. Some of these factors are just innocent little glitches that are mainly irritating without causing too much of a problem. Other factors are downright evil and can only be due to the work of the devil.

First off, you are not allowed to stick the tanks if any customer is pumping gas at the same time. I was never made privy to the reasoning behind this protocol, but the impression was given that someone could feasibly perish if you dare to stick while pumping is taking place. So you had to wait until the wee hours of the morning, when the roads were relatively quiet and chances were slim that someone would require a petroleum product from your establishment.

Unfortunately, the only people who ARE on the road in the wee hours tend to be drunken people with focus issues. The entire parking lot could be vacant, not a soul in sight, when suddenly there’s a roar and some crazed redneck could come barreling out of the night.

Why is this critical?

Well. Each gas pump had its own tank. This store had four pumps, ergo four tanks. You would think all of the tank access points would be in a central area. They are not. They are scattered all over the parking lot. Sometimes they are in incredibly stupid places, like smack in the middle of the parking lot entrance. (You’ve seen these things and may not have realized it. You know those metal plates in the asphalt that you sometimes drive over, and they make that horrendous noise like you’ve just lost your transmission? Bingo.)

　

So you have to be very careful when you are sticking the tanks, because you’re right in the traffic zone, but because you’re bent over screwing around with the rusty cap or the wooden stick, people don’t necessarily see you, especially if they’ve had 14 margaritas over at Sally’s Pool Hall. They might see the STICK, because it’s taller than the store, but drunken people don’t take heed of a flimsy stick. Such a thing is not going to slow them down in their quest for some Doritos and a pack of beef jerky.

End result, you need to be very quick when you stick, and if you even THINK you hear tires squealing on pavement, you drop the stick and run like hell.

Trouble is, there are challenges that might impede you from making a hasty job of things. For one, it’s often pitch black around the tank openings. You can’t see the damn numbers. So you have to wiggle the stick around, trying to catch a glimmer of reflective light from the stars or maybe a passing plane. Or you have to drag the stick over to a better light source, which means the tank access pit is wide open while you do so, and Aunt Effie, who just needs a few eggs for the church breakfast, might break an axle when she pulls in.

Wait, there’s more. Because there are multiple tanks that need sticking, you have to DRY OFF the stick between tanks. Otherwise, you can’t tell where the new “wet line” is. So there you are, with an oily rag, rubbing away on this enormous stick, trying to hurry and creating enough friction that there could feasibly be a flash fire. As you stand over hundreds of gallons of gasoline.

Meanwhile, Justine is inside the store, sipping her coffee and laughing her ass off as I race madly around the parking lot, twisting, sticking, reading, and rubbing, not to mention running for the hills every five seconds when I hear a car coming.

And what makes Justine laugh even MORE? Fuel delivery night.

Because on those nights, there’s an additional tank to stick. This one is on wheels. And the access point is two stories off the ground. Yes, boys and girls, we actually have to climb ON TOP of the tanker truck that rolls up with fresh fuel.

Picture it. I’m clutching that humongous stick, trying not to whip it around too much and possibly decapitate the tanker driver. I have to climb up this ladder on the side of the tanker, using only one hand, of course, and this ladder has very thin rungs spaced widely apart. It’s like a demented jungle gym designed by twisted and bored sadists.

Once I’m on top of the tanker? Well, I’m sure you’ve seen these things. The tank is round, one long tube full of sloshing liquid. Meaning the top of the tanker is not flat. It curves downward to both sides. One misstep and I could be sliding and tumbling to my death. So it’s all about taking slow, baby steps, inching my way to the access cap. Twist the thing open, shove in the stick, write down the number, slap the cap back on, slip-slide my way back to the jungle gym, and try not to poke anybody with the stick before I’m back on solid ground.

And hey, I get to do this whole routine TWICE. We measure before they unload the fuel, and after they unload the fuel, so we then know how much our bill should be. (I told you this was primitive.)

So on delivery nights, after sticking four tanks and the tanker, drying off the stick every time I turn around, running from drunken motorists, cussing the laughing Justine as she pops out in the parking lot and yells at me on the tanker “Hey, you’re out of sugar! Hurry up!”, I’m usually completely exhausted by 3am. I’m covered in dried sweat, reeking of gasoline, and I just want to go home.

It was the morning after one of these delivery nights that I had another thrill-filled adventure at this evil store. Because of the delivery, I had been behind on all my other duties, just barely finishing up when the next shift arrived. I staggered out the door, filled up my car with some of the fresh gasoline (might as well), and started to drive away.

Then I realized that I had forgotten to finish out my shift report. It would only take a second to do, so I left the car running while I dashed inside, added a few figures, signed the thing and shoved it in the appropriate slot, then raced back to my car.

The door was locked. What the hell? Did I do that? WHY would I do that? The car was running, so obviously the keys were inside, but I peeked in the window anyway to confirm. Yep. There they were, dangling away and teasing me. Out of desperation, I checked the passenger door and the hatchback. Of course they were locked.

You have GOT to be kidding me.

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#11 - What’s Love Got to Do with It?, Part I

1986, just a few days into the year. Most people were still hung over, and society in general was moving very slowly in that lethargic, oh my GOD, we have another year to deal with kind of way.

Tina Turner was coming to town, and I desperately wanted to see her in concert. She was still riding high from the “Private Dancer” album that had snatched her from relative obscurity and threw her back to the top of the charts where she rightfully belonged. The girl was blazing hot and everybody wanted a piece of that.

Well, not everybody.

Trouble is, I was scheduled to work the night of the concert, and I was having an irritatingly difficult time getting anyone to trade shifts with me. No one was interested in my dilemma. (I perhaps should have kept my mouth shut about the actual reason for the trade. Attending a concert is not quite the same as, say, a medical condition requiring surgery.)

I couldn’t even get a polite “maybe” out of any of my co-workers. Looking back, this should not have surprised me one bit. After all, I was working with a bunch of redneck guys that had probably never even heard any music that did not involve banjos and farming vehicles of some kind. In addition, all of these guys were bitter, vindictive men who hated where they worked and, by association, hated everyone who worked there with them.

You see, at the time, I was employed by the illustrious firm of Quik Trip, Inc. This was (and still is) a chain of convenience stores based in Tulsa. And actually, as far as convenience stores go, we were at the top of the food chain. Quik Trip was known for the cleanliness of the stores and the quality of the service. We actually received considerable training. And our outfits were cuter than anybody else.

But still. It was a convenience store. There was only so much glamour and excitement to go around.

And even when you work for a high-end and fancy chain like that, there are going to be some pitfalls. Not all employees got the opportunity to experience the tragic side of the corporation. In fact, most of the employees were unaware of such a thing as the “high-risk” store.

Sounds intriguing, yes? It’s not. This just means that a particular store has been constructed in a part of town that has seen far better days. That there might be some unsavory characters comprising part of your clientele. In fact, because it’s a “high-risk” store, one of your customers might even kill you and take all the Fritos and bean dip. But hey, we had a great benefits package.

I don’t know why they had these stores. Most of the Quik Trip locations were in really nice parts of town, or at least decent parts of town. All of the customers were yuppies and everyone said “Thank you.” But for whatever reason, the corporation insisted on this handful of stores in some really dumb-ass places.

I didn’t start out in a risky store. My initial assignments were way in the south of Tulsa, at that time a booming place of exploding growth. Buildings were going up so fast that the concrete was still wet. I liked working in those stores. People were thoughtful and kind, full of grace and humanity. Probably because they weren’t running for their lives to avoid being gunned down by the local crack dealer.

In fact, there was one holiday when I had to pull a triple, working from 3pm on Christmas Eve to 3pm on Christmas day. (I was the only single person on staff at that store, I have a soft spot in my heart when it comes to Christmas, and I could use the premium pay.) I expected the customer flow to be light. What I didn’t expect was what those few customers would do when they walked in the door.

They brought me food. Christmas dinner. When you work in a particular location, you get to know the regulars, and they get to know you. You see the same people every day, and you develop mini-friendships. But still, it didn’t prepare me for the neighborhood reaction when word got out that I was pulling a triple on Christmas.

Next thing I know, there’s a parade of people lugging in all kinds of stuff to eat. Before long, there was enough food stacked in the walk-in cooler that I could have lived in there for weeks. It completely moved me, decent people doing a decent thing, that they didn’t have to do. (Yes, I cried a little bit when no one was in the store.) One of those moments when your belief in the basic goodness of humanity is affirmed.

I smiled a lot when I worked in the south Tulsa stores.

Then the day came when I smiled no more.

The area manager called me up one day, when I was singing and twirling in one of the pretty stores, and advised me that he had a GREAT opportunity. One of his stores had a staff that was a little unfocused, and they needed some help getting things in order. My performance appraisals showed that I was doing a humdinger of a job, and they sure could use me up in the north part of town.

Stupidly, I let myself be flattered. (They liked me! They really liked me!) Whatever I can do, Mr. Area Manager Man, to help this company be a shining beacon to the nation. Just tell me where to go and I’ll go there at once.

“There” turned out to be the intersection of Lewis and Admiral. Uh oh. I didn’t know much about the exact location, but I knew enough about the general vicinity that my heart skipped a beat. It was an incredibly crappy part of town. What was this man doing to me? I thought we were friends.

He kept chattering away on the phone, really trying to talk up this new assignment. Now that I had been apprised of an actual address, I suddenly noticed the desperation he was cleverly trying to hide in his voice. This was not his first phone call of the day. I was no longer a humdinger. I was merely the next in line on what was apparently a long list.

I slightly hinted that perhaps I would like to stay where I was. He hinted back a little more strongly that if I wanted to move up at all in the company, that I WOULD be doing this, and doing it with great enthusiasm. Oh, and there would be a slight bump in pay if I played nice and said yes.

Oh, well that did it right there. More money? At a time when the only furniture in my tiny apartment was strategically-placed record albums? Hell, yeah. What’s the address again?

Little did I know that employees in these high-risk stores referred to the salary “bump” as combat pay. It would not take me long to understand this terminology. In fact, it would not take me long to consider using my bump to purchase protective weapons from some of my new customers. The kind of customers that did not bring you food.

Let me tell you a little bit about the location of this store.

At one time, this had been a rather plush place to live and work. It was not that far from the original “downtown” Tulsa, so my assumption is that some of the fancier families had moved to the area and created a bustling neighborhood. By studying some of the buildings from the past that are still standing, you realize that some serious money went into their construction.

I have no idea what happened between then and now, but it wasn’t good. It was a total crap-fest by the time I rolled up to my newest Quik Trip assignment, several decades after the bloom was gone from this former flower of the city.

Directly across the street was a blood bank, housed in one of the faded-glory buildings of yore. There is one thing you need to understand about blood banks that are located in low-income sections of town, especially if the star-date is 1986: One of the biggest donor segments is composed of drunks and homeless people. Not kidding.

This blood bank was actually a satellite office, so they only accepted donations on certain days. On these designated mornings, I would watch these filthy people crawl out of wherever, and then attempt to form a line in front of the building, even though most of them had the jitters of some kind and could not keep still. It was quite a sight.

Once they had been drained and received a cash payment for their services (yes, they were paid, this was not an act of generosity on their part), the drunks would walk out the bank door, stagger across the busy street with no regard for oncoming traffic, and throw themselves through the front door of our store. Once inside, they headed to the beer section and picked out the best combination of cheapness and quantity they could find.

Then they would wobble up to the counter, throw down their selection, and demand a pack of smokes as well. They would spend every last penny on beer and cigarettes. It made me sick. But there was nothing I could do, I had to ring them up. They weren’t drunk at the time of purchase, although they soon would be. And out the door they would go.

This is what some people become. And so it goes. Reflect on your life, and be thankful. Just sayin.

Directly to the right of our store was an odd, brown building. There were no recognizable windows in this building, just some very decrepit and old wooden siding, running the whole perimeter of the building. There were no signs to indicate exactly what type of establishment this might be.

But something was going on over there. At the back of the lot was a small parking lot, holding perhaps ten or twelve cars. And it was always full. Always. I never saw anyone enter the building, or leave the building, but the cars changed all the time.

It was fascinating, in a way. But creepy in another. Seriously, what was that thing all about?

As mentioned, when you work in a convenience store, you develop mini-friendships. People open up after a while. So I tried to do a little sleuthing concerning this mysterious structure.

Me: “So, what’s up with the brown building?”

Mack Daddy Yo: “That one over there? Hell, I don’t know. Ain’t got no clue. You?

Me: “Uh, no. That’s why I’m asking. Ever been in there?”

Mack Daddy Yo: “Me? Hell no. I’m not goin in there. My girl said somebody died up in there.”

Me: “Died? Really?”

Mack Daddy Yo: “Hell yeah. DEAD kinda dead.”

Me: “Wow, that’s some kinda dead alright.” (Yes, you pick up the lingo after a while, can’t help it.)

Mack Daddy Yo: “Sho nuff. Say, you got the new ‘Juggs’ in?”

On the other side of the brown death-building, once you crossed Admiral, was a porn store. A very popular porn store. Apparently, people came from miles around to peruse the wares. In fact, it was such a happening spot that, on the weekends, the porn store parking lot would fill up, and randy folks would start parking in our lot.

Which meant that one of our weekend duties, believe it or not, was chasing off the this surplus so that people who wanted to visit OUR store would be able to do so. That was a lot of fun, intercepting drunk and horny people, and trying to make them understand that they would have to move. This was known as porn duty. Me being the new guy, I usually got stuck with this thrilling assignment.

Me: “Dude, you can’t park there.”

Jerk: “Why the hell not? Who the hell are you?”

Me: “I work right here. If you’re going to BUY something right here, that’s cool, come on in.”

Jerk: “You got any snatch mags?”

Me: “Well, nothing like you’re going to find over there.”

Jerk: “Then I don’t wanna go in there.”

Me: “Then you need to move.”

Jerk: “Who the hell are you? I can park wherever the hell I want. Hell.”

Me: “You need to move. Or I can call the cops. You want me to call the cops? I can do that. Seriously. Want me to?”

Jerk: “Oh really? Well, I can kick your ass. You want me to kick your ass? I can do that.”

(Keep in mind that I’m 20 years old at the time. I don’t look like I can kick a pebble, let alone an ass. Yet I’m supposed to be Mr. Tough Guy in charge of chasing off the drunken farmers who are determined to find pleasure in lewd publications. I don’t WANT to be this guy. I’m all FOR the release of sexual tension. Go Big O! But I have bills to pay and a job to keep.)

Me: “Dude, come on. I’m just telling ya what’s what. If I owned this store, you could do whatever you want, hump the gas pumps, knock yourself out. But I don’t own it. I just work here. And I wanna keep my job. You with me?”

Jerk, pausing for a second as he sways back and forth beside his car, then: “Yeah, I guess. But I wanna see some titties. I just wanna SEE some TITTIES!”

(Am I seriously having this conversation? I graduated from high school with honors. I have two years of college under my belt. And I have no desire to look at titties. Ever. But circumstances have led to me having this particular verbal exchange with some inbred yahoo whilst standing in the parking lot of a convenience store in the bad part of town. I really thought my SAT scores would have gotten me beyond this. My high school counselors lied to me. I hate them.)

Just as Jethro is about to cause some serious hurt, there’s the familiar whup-whup of a police car sounding a preliminary warning. The farmer turns and runs like a laxative just kicked in, leaving his car behind. Fine. We’ll have it towed in the morning. In the mean time, the wino blood donors have a place to sleep for the night.

The squad car that pulls into our parking lot is being driven by my police officer friend Justine. She’s the real deal, tough as all get out, and doesn’t have a problem telling anybody to go anywhere. Therefore, I deeply love her, in a non-titty way, especially since I’m stationed here on the outskirts of hell. She helped me out a lot during my time in purgatory.

Like the night I was almost killed.

Okay, it never really got THAT far, but it could have. It played out something like this:

It’s fairly late at night for most people, but really just the beginning of Armageddon for this part of town, when all the crazies wake up from their drug-induced comas and go looking for kicks. I’m in the store all alone, trying to do the cigarette order for this week. This activity basically consists of me counting every single pack of every brand that we have in the store, comparing the totals to how many we had last week, and then determining how many I should order for the following week. This is not why I took Calculus in high school, but perhaps I’m whining a bit.

The door bangs open and in wanders some wild-eyed teenager who is clearly underage. He marches back to the beer section, picks up a 12-pack, then saunters up to the counter, all cocky and such. I immediately ask to see his ID.

(Side note: I’m only 20 at the time. I’m not of legal age to purchase alcohol, but I can sell it. Such was the twisted state of legality in Oklahoma at the time. Might even still be the case. I haven’t been there in a while.)

Stoner dude is not happy that I asked for his ID. He argues. I argue back. He calls me a variety of names that rhyme with buckhead and baggot. I don’t give in. He finally has had enough, shoves the beer toward me so that it falls on the floor at my feet, then stomps out of the store.

Great. Yet another confrontation to confirm that my life is a living hell. I go back to counting cigarettes.

A bit later, as I’m stooped over and counting some inventory on a lower shelf, I hear someone banging on the glass doors at the entrance of the store. Come on people, I’m busy here. Just open the door and come on in. I stand up and look toward the front of the store.

The wild-eyed teenager is on the other side of one of the doors. When he realizes that he has my attention, he raises both arms and places his hands, fingers splayed and palms forward, on the door, just above his head. Then his tongue snakes out of his mouth, and he licks the glass in one long, freaky trail of saliva.

At that moment, that precise pinpoint in time that I will never forget (trite, but true), I completely understood what the expression “blood runs cold” really means. This was so not right. I suddenly couldn’t breathe.

Then he peels his left hand off the glass, reaches down into the waistband of his pants, and pulls out a gun.

Which he then points directly at ME.

Click Here to Read the Next Entry in This Series:

http://lageose3.blogspot.com/2010/01/12-whats-love-got-to-do-with-it-part-2.html

#10 - I’m Too Sexy

Trigger: The J.C. Penney ad in the Sunday paper.

Flash:

1981, late summer just beginning my junior year in high school. My friend Stephanie (I think it was Stephanie, a little fuzzy on that, but probably so) had convinced me to join her on a mission to obtain gainful employment. She was headed to an interview, and I was basically along for the ride. Obviously, I was bored and in need of any entertainment I could find.

Our destination was Southland shopping center in Tulsa which, at the time, was still a fairly happening place, despite fierce, newer competition. It was a fair drive from our homes in east Broken Arrow to this part of the big city, so I didn’t have complete faith that my friend had applied any logic in deciding to pursue a career in this particular location.

Stephanie had an interview with J.C. Penney. I don’t recall what type of position this might have been, but it didn’t really matter. Stephanie always seemed to have about four different jobs going at any given time, and she always seemed to do exceedingly well at each of them until some mysterious thing would transpire where she would be let go. I would imagine the breaking point in each case involved her vocal cords. Stephanie completely believed in free speech, and did not have the time or patience for conversational delicacies

Anyway, Stephanie marched into the inner chambers of the J.C. Penney employment offices, leaving me to bide my time just outside the entrance. That was fine by me. I’m one of those people who finds amusement in people-watching, since it’s quite amazing what you will see otherwise decent people do in public if they think no one is watching. And considering this time frame in the early 80‘s, when half the country was still stoned and the other half was just discovering cocaine, there was plenty of colorful traffic to keep me occupied.

My little game, however, was shortly interrupted by Stephanie as she rattled out the employment door. “You need to go in there,” she announced, shoving some fresh paperwork into a pocket.

“Why?”

“Because they have a ton of jobs, on this board right when you go inside. All kinds of stuff. Surely you can do something.”

I didn’t exactly seize this suggestion with full joy and excitement. “I don’t know. I’m not even dressed for an interview.”

“You look fine.”

I did not look fine. I was wearing a form-fitting t-shirt and a pair of army-green cargo pants. Plus, I was experimenting with a new wind-swept hairdo that didn’t exactly speak highly of my professional skills. I wouldn’t have hired myself in that getup.

I opened my mouth to protest further, but Stephanie gave me one of her looks, which clearly indicated that she was not going to back down. She was always the one pushing me into things. Often times, her suggestions led to total failure and complete embarrassment, but just as often we would have a really good time as long as no one got permanently injured.

So I opened the door and went in, not because I particularly wanted a job, but because I didn’t want to hear about my failures as a human being on the long drive back to Broken Arrow.

Fifteen minutes later, I was in an interview with a short little man who cleared his throat a lot. He seemed to spend an uncomfortably long amount of time studying my application, which listed exactly one prior work experience. Because that’s all I had. I was 16 and directionless, not 35 with a master’s degree in Business Management. What did he expect?

He continued to study my paperwork. I continued to wonder why this was necessary. My former position had been in clothing retail. J.C. Penney was a retail establishment that sold, among other things, clothes. Either I was qualified or I wasn’t. I didn’t have anything else to offer.

Oh wait. Maybe I did. I suddenly realized that the little man was sneaking furtive glances at my chest. I glanced just as furtively, and realized that my nipples were on high-beam, accentuated by the t-shirt that was perhaps a bit snug. Maybe it was the air-conditioning in the office. Or maybe it was that being 16 thing again, where I was in a perpetual state of horniness. Granola made me horny. The wind blowing made me-

He startled me out of my thoughts by clearing his throat once more. “I can offer you a position as a stocker.”

A stocker? I was on the retail floor at my last job. I didn’t stock things. I didn’t have to do THAT unless the actual stocker didn’t show. (Yes, I had a bit of an elitist attitude. I believe it’s fair to say that I’ve had an attitude since I first shot out of the womb. No surprise there.)

Then he threw me off by announcing that my starting pay would be 25 cents more an hour than I had been making before. This was an amazing leap in earnings considering it was 1981. Any further whining at this point would have been deemed pointless, so my nipples and I signed on the dotted line and I became an entry-level employee working for one James Cash Penney. (Even though he was already dead at this point, it was still exciting to be in the family.)

And my career as a stocker lasted exactly two days before I was repositioned on the sales floor.

You see, the man who interviewed me turned out to also be my supervisor, which I guess put me on the inside track for advancement. While I was still toiling in the basement, loading carts with Levi’s for people who apparently had very big waists and very short legs, he would come down to see how I was doing. After about the third visit in an hour or so, it dawned on me that there might be something to make of this situation.

Now, I didn’t overtly do anything sexual, but I sure as hell did my best to appear charming, feigning amazed interest in anything he had to say. And okay, perhaps I did some physical stretching every time there was the remotest need for stretching. But other than that, no hanky panky.

By the end of the second night, he informed me that I could start the next day on the sales floor. Wow, this climbing the corporate ladder thing is pretty nifty. I really didn’t understand why other people were so whiny about it.

I was placed in the Menswear department, shoving the latest in reasonably-priced fashion into the arms of customers seeking validation via clothing. It really wasn’t a bad job at all. I enjoyed it most of the time, I met a lot of interesting people, and there were even a few regular customers who would come in just to chat and flirt a little bit. Who knew that working at J.C. Penney could prove to be so titillating?

The only real drawback to the job was that, after attending school all day and then working four or five hours in the store, I was faced with that incredibly epic road trip from Tulsa to the outskirts of Broken Arrow every night. It was brutal. It was all I could do to stay awake on that long drive, often times rolling down the window and sticking my head out into the cold air to slap some awareness into me. Other than that, I was a happy camper.

Until that fateful day.

I had just walked out onto the sales floor, thinking I looked cute in a new sweater and some old corduroys that had faded just right, when Kim, who worked in the neighboring Western Wear department, rushed up breathlessly, her eyes bulging with excitement.

“The mystery shopper is here!”

I eyed Kim with slight distrust. I didn’t really care for her. She seemed way too flighty, overheating about nothing, and she had a tendency to be a bit snooty. I didn’t understand the snootiness. She obviously didn’t come from money or she wouldn’t be working here. (The employee discount wasn’t THAT good.) And at times it was difficult to get her to focus on the task at hand. Like now.

She was already running back to her department, intent on some unfathomable task. I followed and cornered her near this vise-like contraption they used to cut customer names into western belts. “What mystery shopper?” I asked, as she shoved a belt into the machine.

She looked at me with astonishment. “The MYSTERY shopper!” she exclaimed. “Don’t you know what that is?” She shook her head and started fiddling with knobs on the machine, causing the thing to clank and rattle.

“No, Kim, I don’t know what that is. Or I wouldn’t be asking you what it is.” Clank, rattle, shove. “What is the mystery shopper?” Clank, rattle, shove. “Could you please let go of that damn machine for a second and talk to me?”

She paused and stared at me in horror, as if I had just rudely slapped her with my uncivilized paw. Oops. I had forgotten that Kim does not believe in cursing of any kind. Sigh. This was turning into a lot of work and I didn’t know if I had the strength. “Just tell me. Please?”

She relented, realizing that I was just another lost soul who hadn’t quite found Jesus. “She’s going to rate you.”

“Rate me?” (Looking back, I guess I was pretty clueless and naïve. You’d think something would have clicked at this point. But I’d never heard the phrase before.)

“She’s going to evaluate your sales technique. And it goes in your file.”

It finally sank in. Got it. Kim went back to fiddling with the belt machine. But I had another question. “Um, Kim?”

She gave me a look that clearly indicated it was about time for me to scurry back to my own department. “Um, if you already know who the mystery shopper is, isn’t that kind of cheating?” In other words, Kimberly the Good, aren’t you teetering toward a sin of some kind?

Her face hardened a bit. “It’s NOT cheating. Everybody does it. They always use the same lady, and as soon as you see her come in the store, you tell everybody else, that’s just what we do.” She paused, then added. “If you don’t want me to let you know, then next time I’ll just-”

“No, that’s okay, we’re good. So where’s she at now, the mystery lady?”

Kim snatched up the station phone, dialed someone, said “What’s the scoop”, then “Uh-huh” about 14 times, then slammed the phone down. “She’s in Hardware. We’ve got about 20 minutes.”

I sprang into action, briskly scurrying out of her department, then stopped. “Wait, what does she look like?”

Kim actually laughed. “Oh, you’ll know. Don’t worry.”

I wasn’t sure about that, but hightailed it anyway.

Back in the Menswear section, I tidied up the desk area as much as possible. I didn’t know if that would be part of my score, but I wasn’t taking any chances. On one end of the counter, there was a stack of Levi’s, probably the result of someone cleaning up the dressing room, refolding the merchandise, and then not bothering to put them back on the shelves. Slackers.

I grabbed the stack and headed to the back of the department, where we had all the jeans shoved into cubes on the wall. I distributed most of the pairs of jeans to their proper home, with one extra-large pair left over. The really big sizes ran along the lowest shelf of the wall. I squatted down on my haunches to park this last pair.

As I did so, there was a tremendous ripping noise, quickly followed by a burst of cool air where I shouldn’t be feeling any refreshing breezes. I had just blown out the seam of my previously cute but faded corduroys, with the rupture running from my lower crotch all the way to the waistband in back.

I stood up as quickly as I could, glancing around wildly to determine who might have seen what. Miraculously, there was no one around. Sadly, this did not remain the case for very long.

Kim come crashing through from the Western Wear department, practically yelling from the periphery of my section. “She’s on her way!” Then she vanished.

You have got to be kidding me. My ass is hanging out of my pants and I’m about to get evaluated for my job performance. How is this happening?

I raced to the checkout counter, telling myself I would just have to deal with it. I couldn’t just head downstairs and change. I was the only one scheduled, and it was absolutely verboten to leave your section unattended, you had to get someone to cover for you. Surely that would be part of the evaluation. Wait, maybe Kim could cover for a sec.

Just then, I heard Kim start speaking in an overly pleasant, chirpy manner to some unseen person, so the deal was already going down a few paces away. No time. I just stood there and tried to breathe, sweat running down my back. I just had to remember to keep my butt facing away from the lady.

Wait a minute. My stocker apron thing. That should still be around here somewhere. Maybe that would cover up some of the damage. In case Mystery Shopper asked, I could lie and say I was doing double duty tonight, short-handed and all. I dropped down and started shoving things around on the shelves under the counter. What IS all this crap down here?

“Have a GREAT day!” chirped Kim from the Western province.

Oh geez, I’m up next. She’ll be here any minute. Where in the hell is that apron? I know I left it here. (Is that somebody’s lunch?) Why can’t people just leave things where-

“Excuse me.”

The voice came from just over my head and I leaped to my feet, barely suppressing a squeal and probably ripping out a few more threads in the widening gulch that used to be my pants.

Standing directly in front of me was the oddest woman I had ever seen. She was wearing a tightly-cinched black trench coat, with black leggings poking out from beneath the coat and leading to black pumps. (That outfit was all kinds of wrong already.) She had long black hair spilling down the front of her coat in an upside-down V formation, reflecting the light in a way that almost says “wig” but really isn’t.

Her face was extremely pale, and she had somehow managed an application of lipstick on her upper lip without any sharing of color with the lower lip. Her hands had been behind her back when I first gophered up from below the counter, but she quickly whipped her right arm around, with the hand encased in a black leather glove and brandishing an extremely long screwdriver.

“I would like to purchase this,” she stage-whispered dramatically, shoving the implement within inches of my nose.

Oh my God, this woman was out of her mind if she thought she was any good at being a mystery shopper. Did she seriously think she wouldn’t stand out wearing something like that, with the severe gothic drama? (Side Note: In my later years, upon reading my first Anne Rice book, I flipped to the author photo in the back and screamed “That’s the woman that shoved a screwdriver at me in Penney’s!” Some things you never forget.)

Luckily, her crazed appearance calmed me down just enough that I could fake it through the rest of this supposedly secret appraisal. It was clear that she was the mystery shopper, how could she not be, taking it so seriously that she went overboard and considered herself some type of espionage agent. Every employee in the store must be able to pass the test, knowing full well who she was. Anybody can be pleasant for five minutes. And I could pass it, too. As long as I kept her in front of me.

So I went through the motions, smiling so much my cheeks ached and pouring on the charm, making sure to suggest additional items she might be interested in and inviting her to “come back and see us.” Eventually she was satisfied with the surveillance and wandered away, snatching up something from a sale rack as preparation for her next victim in Cosmetics.

I let out a deep sigh of relief, relaxing my butt cheeks that had been clenched the entire duration, and then turned around, ready to initiate a speedy plan to find some new clothes.

There was a woman standing at the opposite counter.

I wouldn’t say that she was appalled, exactly. Instead, her expression was one of bafflement. Had she really seen what she thought she had just seen? She pondered this a second or two, and then decided yes, she had indeed seen exposed tightie whities. She had been clutching a dress shirt, which she gently placed on the counter, and then simply walked away.

The phone rang. It was Kim. “How did it go?”

“Get over here. NOW!”

Click.

#9 - Running On Empty, Part II

Amazingly, the confession session with Mom did not turn out to be nearly as brutal as I had anticipated. After all, in the previous fifteen minutes, I had bellowed rude and hateful things, stomped away in anger to signify my displeasure with her existence, and then promptly wrecked two family cars. I was fairly certain that I was not her favorite child at the moment.

But she took things rather calmly. It would have been a perfect opportunity for her to unleash 17 years of frustration and provide unsavory commentary explaining exactly how I had ruined her life. Yet she did not take advantage of this understandable outlet, and instead again resorted to one of those mysterious Mom Things wherein they operate in a manner that is contradictory and confusing to the child.

Granted, she was far from pleased. And as I continued babbling, her mouth got smaller, which, I learned long ago, meant that she wanted to say more than she was saying, but was holding it back for now. As long as I didn’t do or say something else stupid, those particular words might never be spoken and there would be peace in the valley. I immediately shut up and tried to appear angelic.

She dismissed me shortly thereafter. The only form of punishment that she bestowed upon me was the decree that I could now ONLY drive the station wagon, assuming that my vehicular frenzy had not left the thing inoperable.

Wow, that was easy. So what if the wagon had a bashed-in door? I already hated that thing with every fiber of my being. It was ALREADY a completely humiliating horror show to drive. How could it possibly damage my reputation any further if the door was hanging off?

How wrong that thought proved to be.

From a functional standpoint, the station wagon was fine, just uglier. From an operational standpoint, things got a little murkier. From a frustration standpoint, I nearly lost my mind. Several times.

The driver’s side door, mashed in as it was, created a challenging new environment for the driver. While things on the dashboard remained exactly where they had been prior to impact, the position of the driver did not. With the door taking up more space than a door should, you were forced to take a seat somewhat to the right of the optimal location.

You had to reach slightly to the left for driving implements that should have been directly in front of you.

Let’s take the steering wheel. It was impossible to place your hands in the strongly-advised, clock-inspired positions of “ten” and “two”. It was more like “two” and “two”. Or whatever hour you could latch on to as you reached to your side.

The gas pedal? That was relatively okay. You could get at that thing fairly easy with either foot. The brake pedal was a different story. It was now in the “dead zone”, a difficult-to-reach space created when the door was re-located. Because the main portion of your body now rested in the wrong place, you had to snake your left foot in an awkward manner and stretch out your toes to reach the pedal.

And I was sadly mistaken about the humiliation level concerning the redesign of the station wagon. Yes, it had always been ugly, but in a benign and slightly sad way. People would avoid me, based on the appearance of my pathetic ride, assuming that my life was of little interest and I would probably die of alcoholism at a young age.

Now we had ugly mixed with crash-test-dummy accents. This combination brought the crazies out of the woods. People in neighboring cars at stoplights would point and show the kids. Other cars would honk while passing, as if giving me an aural high-five for surviving the crash. Old men at Piggly Wiggly would walk up in their baggy pants, scratching their butt and spittin tobacco, and ask “How’d you do THAT, son?”

That always killed me, all the people wondering how I “did that”. From a purely logical analysis of seeing the damage, it was clear that another vehicle had hit this one. Why did people immediately assume that I was somehow responsible? Shouldn’t they be feeling sorry for me, as the unfortunate victim, instead of assigning blame?

Of course, I couldn’t point out that another car had hit this one, because then I risked follow-up queries that might lead to further humiliation since, basically, I had been the one who hit ME. In my own driveway. Life was hard enough, I didn’t need to open myself up for further suffering.

Eventually, step-dad got one of his buddies to bang on the door for a few days, and things improved slightly. You could actually open the door if you were on level ground and the temperature was right. The driving experience became a little more tolerable. But it was never the same again.

And it wasn’t long before it didn’t really matter if the door opened or not.

You see, I really didn’t know much about the inner workings of a motor vehicle. I had the basic concept down, but that was it. I didn’t WANT to know any more. Because from the age of about seven, my real dad, who worships cars, had been trying to instill that same fervor and excitement in me.

This did not work out so well.

Because I really didn’t care. I had no desire to learn the specialized skill of adjusting a timing belt. This incensed my dad. A real man should be able to completely take a car apart, like he can, and then put it back together, like he can. Thus began many sessions of him schooling me in the art of automotive maintenance. These classes took place in his garage, on the weekends when my sister and I would visit him.

It was torture.

Every session went the same. I would stand beside the car for hours, aiming the stupid flashlight wherever he needed me to aim it, and getting yelled at every fifteen minutes because I handed him the wrong damn wrench again. (He had 500 wrenches. They don’t have THAT many wrenches at NASA.) This would go on for an eternity, until he was finally done doing whatever, dinner was ready, or I broke something. Hated every minute of it.

As a result, I learned nothing. (Well, except for the fact that you cannot cause a garage door to slam down on your dad’s vehicle using mental powers alone.) I didn’t learn about the timing belt. I didn’t learn about maintenance. I certainly didn’t learn about changing the oil in a car on a regular basis.

Which led to the downfall of the battered station wagon. I never even CHECKED the oil, let alone change it. It simply did not cross my mind to do so. Even when Mom would mention it every so often, because, well, she was a mom, and what person of high school age actually listens to their mother?

So there I am one day, probably headed off to a play or something artsy, because I was already showing that fondness for the humanities that so appalled the more macho members of the family. (I certainly wasn’t headed to the drag races, lugging bottles of Strawberry Hill and the one remaining cheerleader that wasn’t already pregnant.)

I’m innocently tooling along the road, obeying all traffic signals and driving friendly, when suddenly there’s an astonishingly loud bang, the car lurches and dies, and I am coasting along with no power.

In a slight panic, I crank hard on the steering wheel so the car will turn and roll into the nearest parking lot, which happens to be the local Wal-Mart. Well good, then. At least the car won’t look out of place while I figure out what to do.

I get out and approach the front of the car. Since that startling noise had come from this direction, and the engine had stopped running, chances were pretty strong that I might find something interesting under the hood. I popped it open, and peered inside.

That proved to be a pointless effort. Things looked okay to me. Then again, I had no idea what the hell I was looking at or for. There could have been a coal furnace in there and I would have thought, wow, I didn’t realize cars needed one of those. I dropped the hood back into place.

Based on some weird instinct that I couldn’t really identify (maybe something HAD sunk in during the evil garage sessions?), I dropped to one knee and peeked under the front of the car.

There was something sticking down. I didn’t know what it was, but it didn’t look right. In fact, it looked seriously wrong and reeked of impending doom. I started to get the first trickle of realization that this was somehow my fault. Oh boy.

I found a payphone (remember those?) and called my friend… um… we’ll call her Delilah, for legal purposes. Delilah was my bud, she would get me out of this if she could. I gave the details of what had just happened. Bang, power loss, rolling turn, Wal-Mart, thing sticking down. She needed more information:

“When was the last time you changed the oil?”

Why was everybody so damn concerned about the oil in this car? God. I seriously did not get a memo somewhere. “Uh… not lately.” (Translation: never.)

“You threw a rod. I’ll be there in ten minutes.” Then she was gone. I practically heard tires squealing before the line disconnected.

Next thing I know, Delilah is roaring into the parking lot, her cute little car purring like a kitten and in perfect condition. She knew how to take care of HER car. Dad would love her. Maybe we were switched at birth? Might need to check into that some day.

Delilah takes about ten seconds to fully investigate the situation and then turns to me. “Okay, here’s the plan.”

“Plan? We have a plan? Why do we have to have a plan? Am I going to jail again?”

She sighs. “Look, there’s not a drop of oil in this thing. There’s no way you can’t be blamed unless we do this just right. Listen carefully.”

I was getting that surreal feeling again, where everything hasn’t registered yet and I’m waiting for things to click and make sense. Was it suddenly going to become necessary for us to run for our lives and hide out in Arizona?

Delilah gave me an exasperated look. “Quit being all drama queen in your head and pay attention.”

The movie soundtrack in my brain abruptly stopped. I faced Delilah and assumed a position of total concentration. “Ready.”

“Okay, run in to this Wal-Mart and buy a couple cans of recycled motor oil. RECYCLED, do you understand? Not the new stuff. Then come back out here and we’re going to pour some all over the engine and the rest under the car. Make it look like there was still oil in there and the damn thing just fell apart.”

I stared at her in amazement. First, how the hell did Delilah know that there was such a thing as recycled motor oil, and that you could get it at Wal-Mart? And how did she come up with a plan like that so quickly? What kind of life has this girl led?

But I had some concerns. “What if-”

“Just go! Now!”

I turned and scampered into Wal-Mart. She was kind of scaring me a little.

15 minutes later the deed was done. Operation Save My Ass was in full swing. Further phone calls were made, discussions took place, and the vehicle was eventually towed. I seriously doubt that anyone really believed me. I certainly didn’t. I don’t remember any direct accusations being made, but surely the family was a little suspicious of my story, at the very least.

If they DID believe me, then I might just be in a wee bit of trouble when I hit “publish” here in a few minutes.

Maybe I better find Delilah’s number. I’ve got it around here somewhere….

#8 - Running On Empty, Part I

Trigger: Watching a TV show wherein this guy is going to an auction to buy a fancy, antique, wood-paneled automobile. A “woody”.

Flash:

We had a woody at one time. (How’s that for a vague but potentially questionable opening line?)

Well, it wasn’t a REAL woody, as in actual wood like on the fancy cars. It was fake wood paneling, the kind that was no longer popular when this story takes place, but you could still find them here and there. That is, assuming that you wanted to do this. And it was a station wagon, so there was absolutely nothing cool about this car at all.

It’s 1981 or 82. I know I already had my driver’s license, but I wasn’t yet a senior in high school, so there you have it, general time frame. It wasn’t actually MY car, but I did drive the thing. And I hated it with a passion. It tortured me, and I tortured it right back. This was not a healthy relationship.

You see, my family did not have a tremendous amount of money, but my mom and step-dad DID have an amazing number of friends who happened to own cars that they no longer cared to keep around. Many of these things would end up at our house, piled up at the end of our long driveway.

I don’t know if money changed hands, I don’t know if these things were slightly-evil gifts, I have no idea how the cars were procured. Until I was able to drive, I couldn’t care less about cars. They were just things parked in the driveway, sometimes as many as 5 or 6 at a time, and on any given day half of them did not run for one reason or another.

We did not win any yard-of-the-month contests in our neighborhood.

Anyway, somewhere along the line this station wagon showed up, ugly as hell. As mentioned, there was the wood-paneling, which immediately ruled out the vehicle as anything desirable whatsoever. Where the paint was still intact, it was a dull, morose brown. I don’t remember if the air-conditioning worked, but probably not. I can recall many childhood summers spent baking in the confines of family vehicles, near asphyxiation and dreaming of a place that did not smell like sweat and vinyl seating.

Once I obtained my license, I became a little more invested in the ragtag collection of metal at the end of the driveway. On a good day, when everything in the current lineup was actually in working order, it was almost fun to pick out what you felt like driving that day. There was an actual selection involved.

On bad days, and there were quite a few of these, when some of the heaps weren’t running or there was an influx of people temporarily staying with us who needed some loaner transportation, there was no enjoyable decision-making. I had to drive the station wagon, if I got to drive at all. I had low seniority in the driving pool, and I got what was left. No discussion.

So me and the butt-ugly station wagon spent a lot of time together. And things just never managed to go my way when I was driving the thing. Stuff just happened that didn’t happen to other people.

My first day at my first real job? I was driving the station wagon, natch, which was bad enough, I clearly wouldn’t be impressing any of my new co-workers rattling up in that thing. The place that hired me (David’s, for all my peeps back in Broken Arrow) had just been built, and they were still working on the landscaping, with heavy machinery doing some grading off to one side.

Here comes dorky me, bouncing along in the Brady Bunch relic, just trying to find the employee parking area. Of course, I make a wrong turn and suddenly I’m in the dirt field with the grading machinery. Great. Just then, some scooper thing drives up and snags one of the piles of dirt that are everywhere. The driver then nimbly whips around to head somewhere, just as a fierce gust of wind rips the top third of loose dirt out of his scoop, sending a billowing cloud in my direction.

It’s summer. It’s hot. So of course the windows are down in the station wagon, that’s just how we lived. And my dumb ass is sitting there in the middle of a dirt field with wind, dust, Dorothy and Toto headed my way.

There’s no time to roll up the window, it was manual. All I could do was just sit there and wait. I at least had enough sense to close my eyes as a thick red-brown fog blasted through the station wagon.

When the air finally cleared, I dusted off the rearview mirror and assessed the damage. My hair was completely coated in a gritty layer of dirt, I couldn’t hear very well out of one ear there was so much crud sandblasted into there, and since I had been sweating in the heat, any exposed skin looked like I was really serious about the benefits of mud treatments.

I had 15 minutes to clock in.

I threw the car into drive and finally made it to the damn employee parking lot. I leaped out of the car and started digging in the back for anything to clean this crap off of me. I used whatever I could find: oily rags, crusty beach towels, somebody’s shirt. I basically gave myself a sponge bath without the aid of a sponge. Or water.

With seconds to spare, I took another look in the rearview. Amazingly, it didn’t look that bad. Obviously, something wasn’t right with the hair, but you couldn’t really tell what. I have always had extremely thick hair. Apparently the dirt clods had just worked their way deeper into the hair, making it look even thicker, like maybe I had overdone it with some “body enhancing” conditioner.

Most of the mud was gone from my skin, so I quickly dabbed at the few remaining traces. Apparently, the panicky sweat that was now gushing out of me proved to be of great assistance in helping rinse things off. Nature is a wonderful thing. Fine. This would just have to do.

I scurried around to the front of the building, dashing through the doors along with a few other folks getting in just under the wire. (They looked just as startled and anxious as me. Did they also bathe in the parking lot?) My new supervisor was waiting for us, and after some cordial hand-shaking, he turned to lead us to the employee training room.

I turned to trot after them, bringing up the rear. As we marched along, I happened to glance down, and was mortified to see that with each step I took, little puffs of dirt were exploding outward from my shoes. I hadn’t thought to check THERE. Geez.

As I looked back up to make sure I was still following the others, I made eye contact with one of the new girls in the Jewelry department. She had been fiddling with a display of gold chains, but her concentration had been broken when I waltzed up sporting feet that apparently had their own ecosystem.

She gave a slight jump when she realized that she had been caught staring, but recovered nicely and gave me one of those smiles that polite people make when they realize they are seeing something absurd but don’t want to make anyone feel bad about it.

All I could do was return the smile, probably one with mud between the teeth (hadn’t thought of checking there, either), and just keep walking. Her smile widened a little bit (good, my teeth must not be muddy), and then went back to her work. I caught up with the rest of the new hires, and we slipped inside the training room, the door slamming shut behind us.

Thus began my first hour of life as a paid employee….

And the fun continued, with further laffs and adventures as I drove that horrid car around town. I’ll say this much, my friends at the time were the best. First, they never said anything (directly to me, anyway) about that awful contraption. And second, they were willing to ride in the car with me, despite the ever-present threat of physical danger, or at least severe humiliation, that could happen at any moment. That car was just bad luck.

But one of the most appalling things that occurred with the car took place when I wasn’t even driving it.

I was at the house, and Mom and I were engaged in a very heated exchange of words. I don’t recall the details. Most likely she either did or did not want me to do something, and I was very insistent on the opposite choice. You know how it is when you’re 17. You think you know everything, and that everybody else on the entire planet is incredibly stupid. That sort of thing.

Anyway, the discussion did not end well, and I stomped out of the house, headed off to do or not do whatever it was that I did or did not WANT to do. At that particular time, we had an abundance of operating vehicles, so lately I had been driving this jeep/bronco thing (don’t recall the exact make) that was much nicer than the hated station wagon. I would be driving the jeep on this excursion, thank you very much.

I hopped in and started it up, cussing and muttering under my breath, saying all those really good smart-ass responses you wish you had thought of DURING the argument instead of right after. I threw the transmission into reverse and shot backwards. I really don’t think I was intentionally meaning to go as fast as I did. I was just mad and not paying attention.

That lack of attention changed, though, roughly two seconds later, as I slammed into something hard enough that it rattled my teeth. I sat there for a moment, completely unwilling to turn around and see what I had hit, never mind inspect the damage. But I finally sighed and turned.

I had broadsided the station wagon, dead center on the driver’s side door.

Holy cow. My life just went to hell.

I had enough sense to slowly pull forward, listening to see if I was doing even more damage, like pulling the door off or hitting a nun in the process, who knew what could happen next. There was just some minimal scraping noises, no thudding clangs as the transmission fell out.

I turned off the jeep and went for a closer look, with everything bathed in that weird, surreal light where your mind is still trying to process what has happened.

The back of the jeep actually looked fine, I really couldn’t see any dings or scratches that looked unfamiliar. I might see them when my heart stopped pounding and my vision cleared, but okay so far.

I turned to the station wagon.

The driver’s side door, MY door, was bent into a v-shape, with the middle of the door pushed inward, over half of the distance to the steering wheel. This did not look good, no hiding that with some paint. And of course, the door wouldn’t open. Might be able to jack with it later, but it wasn’t budging right now.

I sighed again. Well, time to deal with this. I now had to go back and talk to Mom, the person I had just yelled at, and explain that I had been in a car crash without even leaving the driveway. Great. Yes, somebody had parked the station wagon where they shouldn’t have, normally there are NO cars where the wagon was now sitting, so that tiny bit was in my favor.

But if I had just looked instead of backing up all hog-wild….. Nope, there was no getting out of this one.

Then it hit me. Why wasn’t anybody coming outside to see if I was okay? Surely they heard that crash. I think Helen Keller heard that crash.

I looked toward the house.

Was she actually WAITING for me to come back in? To make the long march of shame up the sidewalk? Was she standing just inside the door, peering out at me, wearing a secret smile that mothers save for this type of situation, where they have complete control of the playing field and they know it?

Why couldn’t she just come on out? So that I didn’t have to explain. I could just stand there as she walked up, and point at the damage, looking really sad. Maybe cry a little bit.

Complete silence from the direction of the house. No movement whatsoever.

Sigh.

I slowly trudged up the sidewalk, thinking of last-minute escape plans. Who could I call? Did I have enough money for a plane ticket? Did they let you stay in homeless shelters even if you are not theoretically homeless? Maybe the priesthood?

I stopped at the front door, milking the delay as long as possible, then I reached down and turned the knob…

Click Here to Read the Next Entry in This Series:

http://lageose3.blogspot.com/2010/01/9-running-on-empty-part-ii.html

#7 - Shadows of the Night

Trigger: Chatting online with the other cohort in this story.

Flash:

University of Tulsa. 1984, maybe 1985. Let’s call it the winter of 84-85, because it was cold. Inhumanely cold. Certain death if not adequately protected while outside, that sort of cold.

And I’m on the planning committee for some shindig, a party of sorts. It was probably something being arranged by the Residence Halls Association, because I was an RA that year. If you had the opportunity to go to college and live on campus, you know about these Resident Assistants. We were the fancy hall monitors that tried to keep peace on our respective floors, patrolling the building at night and trying to keep you from killing yourselves by doing something creative but stupid.

Oh, and we had been trained to do CPR. That was a real plus. Never had to do it once.

But hey, you got free room and board if you were an RA. If you ain’t got no money and you’re going to a private school, you do what you gots to do. Sayin. But really, it was an okay gig. 97% of the time I actually enjoyed it. It was only the occasional drunken frat boy, throwing up in the bathroom and yelling racial slurs, that took the shine off the job. Try dealing intelligently with hormonal, over-privileged snots who have lost their mind on tequila. That’s fun.

Anyway, this party thing. I’ve been tagged to do some promotional work so that we get an adequate turnout. I’ve got a promo buddy to help with this particular task. I won’t mention a name, because we eventually did something that night that was not very nice, but I will at least say that my buddy was female. And she was a real pistol. For those of you who survived that year at the University of Tulsa and knew me, I’m sure you can put two and two together.

Our objective that night was to traipse around the campus, putting up flyers and whatnot. I even think that there might have been balloons, a concept that was probably really nifty in the warmth of a toasty meeting room, but verged on the suicidal when considering the howling, frigid winds that were currently sweeping the campus.

Oh, and we were also supposed to write invitations on the sidewalks crossing the campus, using chalk. This was a popular, but also controversial, method of communication at the time. It was a very effective tool, in that people had to walk to all the buildings in order to attend classes, and therefore couldn’t help but see your message.

But there was a growing contingent of outraged people who were offended by this chalk thing. They found it unseemly. You are not supposed to write graffiti on the sidewalk. It’s rude, and when the chalk washes off the sidewalks it will kill the grass and all the trees and the entire planet.

I didn’t really care for the anti-chalk tree-huggers. I’m all about caring for our planet. Go green. But this is CHALK, people. Not Agent Orange. Nothing is going to die because a trace residue of chalk happens to get in the groundwater.

Anyway, me and my cohort are piddling around in the dorm, fiddling with our promotional materials and doing everything we can to delay heading out into the night, because it’s freaking cold. Wind chill factors can kill, not chalk. The campus was not mammoth, but it certainly wasn’t small, and we had little enthusiasm for tramping all over hell in the wind and cold.

About that time, one of the Residence Directors (meaning one of our bosses) wanders out and quickly sizes up the situation. He realizes that we need some motivational assistance or nothing is going to get accomplished. His suggestion? “Take my car.”

Both of us, who are car-less, look up at him with glistening eyes of gratitude. Done!

So then we’re racing outside, just a few steps away from the front doors of the dorm since Mike always had the best parking place, cramming our things into his tiny little whatever kind of car it was. (It was red, that’s all I remember.)

Then we’re off, motoring from one parking lot to another, doing our thing at the various buildings. And it’s okay at first, as it always is when you’re dealing with extreme cold. You don’t really notice the pain right away. But it doesn’t take long before you can’t get warm. At all.

So we’re sitting in the car in one of the parking lots, breathing heavily after dashing back from the last building we decorated with primitive invites, and really not liking life at all. We can’t feel our extremities. We are slowly dying. What to do?

Then the suggestion is made, and I won’t say who dreamed up this brilliant idea, that since Mike’s car is so tiny, it would probably fit on the actual sidewalks leading to the buildings. We could drive right up to the building and do our thing. It was the monotonous schlepping from the parking lots to the buildings that was sucking the life out of us with this insane, chilling wind.

And what do you know. The car DOES fit on the sidewalk. Game on!

After this remarkable discovery, we’re almost enjoying ourselves. Drive right up to the building, hop out for two minutes to slap up some balloons and a poster, and then madly scribble something on the sidewalk. Jump back in the glorious heated car and head to our next destination.

We are warriors of promotion. Nothing can stop us now.

But something does. We are actually almost done with our mission, just a few stops left, when something unsavory enters the picture.

Cue the theme music from “Jaws”.

Now, I don’t know if they still have these things, but back in our collegiate day the campus security people drove these little golf-cart-looking contraptions as they patrolled the grounds. Cushman carts. Little motorized annoyances that could spring on you at any moment. You did not want to hear the irritating whine they make as you were staggering back from a frat party, since 75% of the students on campus could not legally drink, even though everyone did.

And you certainly did not want to hear that whine when operating a motor vehicle on the sidewalks of a college campus, a place where an automobile clearly should not be.

But we WERE hearing the whine, quickly buzzing in our direction from the west.

Oh boy.

My cohort and I looked at each other. What to do? Well, it was clear what we needed to do. Get the hell out of there before Barney Fife in his go-cart could catch up to us.

At that particular moment, we had just turned onto the sidewalk that led down Fraternity Row. This is a very long sidewalk, with all of the frat houses lined up along the north side. We were nowhere near an actual legal road. The only thing we could do was get to the end of this sidewalk, which terminated at one of the streets bordering the campus.

I floored it.

We are zooming down this sidewalk, with confused and plastered frat boys scurrying to get out of our way as we barreled along. A quick check in the rearview mirror reveals that the Cushman Cart is having trouble keeping up. Great. We just have to get back on the street at the end of the sidewalk and zip away into the night.

What Thelma and Louise have failed to remember is that halfway down this long sidewalk, there is a significant drop in the sidewalk, with stairs leading down to the lower level. The remembrance of this fact comes far too late to stop the speeding vehicle.

Within seconds, we are airborne, with both of us screaming.

Then we slam to earth, sparks flying in all directions. I realize immediately that the frame on this vehicle will never be the same. Well, too late for Plan B. We get to the end of the sidewalk, bounce down the curb, and race away, headed back to the dorm.

Once there, we pile out of the car and thunder inside, throwing the keys at a slightly confused Mike. He wants to know how it went. Great, we say. Best time ever. Then we run around a corner and hide, waiting to see what happens, peeking out every now and then.

A few minutes later, the Cushman Cart rolls into the parking lot and stops behind Mike’s car.

Mike walks to the front door, peers out, assesses the situation, then immediately stomps in our direction. We gulp and prepare for the worst, various alibis flitting through our minds.

“What’s going on? Why is the Cushman Cart Man looking at my license plate?”

We quickly launch into our defense. It was so cold. Oh my God it was so cold. And we were just trying to keep warm. And we were driving on the sidewalks to get closer to the buildings. That’s all we were doing. We didn’t mean any harm. Did we mention that it was cold? We could have died. And it was SO cold-”

Mike holds up his hand. Stop. I’m fully aware that something else happened, because you both look like rabbits after electro-shock therapy, but we’ll focus on the cold, okay?

We both nod our heads vigorously.

“Now, I’m going to go talk to this man. But I’m going to talk to both of YOU, tomorrow. Now go away.”

And he marches off to deal with Barney.

My cohort and I look at each other.

“We need alcohol.”

“Indeed we do..”

“Let’s go.”

And we scamper away into the night…