I have to say that the First of the month is not my favorite time of any month. Especially since we live in the county seat city. There are a good number of people who receive government assistance here and sadly it's mostly generational out here. So when the checks are cut from our generous government to those "less fortunate' (by choice or fate?) the local stores flood with a sorts of people and in my town a good many who haven't bathed in quite a while, nor know how to use a washing machine which puzzles me because it;s this time of month I can never find our favorite detergent in any store...sold out. I have two stories from my trip into town today. Both may be related to the "first of the month"...but ,might not......I am not going to assume anything.
Story 1.....I went to the Wal-Mart. Did my shopping and in spite of the long lines and crowded parking lot I got in and out pretty smoothly. It was on my way out of the parking lot I ran into a pretty funny thing. AS I backed out of my spot and began moving forward a relatively old mini-van with fading paint and a nice layer of filth zoomed out of their parking spot causing me to hit the breaks. Sure I was annoyed but that turned to amused as I realized a hypocrite was in front of me. There pasted all over the back of the (what once was) blue mini-van were several peace signs, "make love, not war" stickers, "Pride Power", and other stickers and signs of various shapes and phrases that impressed on the reader this was a peace loving individual....until you read the green bumper sticker with yellow letters pasted dead center of their back door....it read "If you drive any closer I'm going to slap you". I had to laugh.
The second story is bit more difficult to tell or understand. My town has only 2 full groceries stores and a number of smaller markets. At the lower end grocer I picked up the apples Jim needed for juggling tonight and my Sheboygan Sausages for my lunch. As I walked up to the register I spied a person when gender was difficult to tell. That occupied my thoughts for a moment and then again when it turned out she would be the person directly in front of me....by the way the proximity of being in front of me gave me the clues to figure out "she". Now I'm not judging this person in anyway....I am just sharing my observations. To give you an idea she was from the grunge faction of teens with really long dirty-looking denim shorts, lower-Vans shoes, black baggy t-shirt with a hodge-podge design on it. He hair was long and greasy and she had a ring in her lip; no makeup. No smile. A brooding look owned her face. I couldn't help but notice that with just an tinsy bit of cleaning up and a smile and she would've been very pretty. She was a bit impatient with having to wait. There was a large Hispanic family in front of her with a whole bunch of food and stuff on the conveyor. Besides the food and stuff the dad had set a divider between the family's food and his beer and wine (just a large can and a bottle). When the conveyor belt moved along enough to fit her tofu and spinach she placed her goods on it. Not wanting to reach for a divider she too the one separating the beer from the food and used it to divide her stuff from theirs. Kinda rude. I was thinking since I was after her that I would take the same divider and divide my stuff from hers....you know send a message. I didn't. However, as I was think about that I realized the line had stopped all together and there was a problem with the payment process with the family in front of Grungy. Their teen daughter had to translate for the cashier so the process became more obvious to all of us in line. Their EBT (food stamp card) had only a $1.32 balance. While this was being discussed the dad was already opening a bag of chips and sharing it with his daughter int he cart. Their stuff was bagged. Turned out they were going to have to leave the food in the cart. But they did have enough to buy dad's been and wine with a $5.00 bill. My heart sunk for the kids and I was embarrassed for the family. By the time I really realized what was going on they were on their way out the door. The thought of paying the $143 bill crossed my mind. That all was washed out of my head when I went into the parking lot and watched the family drive off in an SUV nearly twice as expensive as my van. No commentary here....just a story of my trip to the store.
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