Chapter 23: The Miracle of Life

So last night/this morning, I helped my sister to deliver 8 puppies into the world. What a crazy experience. Last night I was at my sister’s house and I knew that her dog was getting ready to give birth so I asked her if she wanted me to spend the night. I’m not sure if you realize this, and actually when I think that Sweet Pea is the only one who reads this she probably does know this about me, but I say things on impulse and don’t ever actually expect it to happen. I volunteered to spend the night, first, not expecting her to say ‘yes’, and after she said ‘yes’ I didn’t expect that her dog would actually have the puppies while I was there! Around 11:30 pm her dog started to have contractions and by 4am she had delivered 8 puppies. I faired better then I expected to, and all the blood and secretions didn’t bother me as much as I thought it would. Oh and the puppies were much cuter then the freaky little aliens I had imagined they would come out looking like. At 4am when the 8th puppy was born I retired to the couch because, to be honest, I was tired. I also had a 9 o’clock appointment at one of my training stores to observe a recent trainee. While I was out cold a 9th puppy came out! It was unexpected and my sister said that it just came out! She changed the sheets and she had the puppies set up so that they could nurse and she looked over and realized there was another one.
It was pretty cool and I took tons of pictures of the puppies (not the whole birthing process…I’d prefer to forget that part).
I woke up and went to my appointment and then I went to the corporate office to teach a class. As it turned out though there wasn’t a class at 12 so I went home, finally showered and went back to my sister’s house to hang out with family and the puppies. I ended up falling asleep for half an hour and then went to teach the 5 o’clock class…tired, groggy, and feeling sick and weak. I got over it though, but not after sitting at the front of the class for a good 15 minutes yawning and zoning out while staring at the carpet. Luckily it was 15 minutes before class started and not during.
TDH was supposed to teach the 5pm class but my manager chose that I should get more practice so he didn’t have to come until 6. At the break I pulled out my camera and asked TDH if he wanted to see what I did last night until 4 in the morning. So I was flipping through the pictures to find a good one of all the pups and he is just sitting there wondering what kept me up until 4 am. Once he saw the pictures he thought it was pretty cool, I almost went into detail about stuff my sister had to do but I decided not to, I was still woozy at this point.
Speaking of the class, my manger is trying to help me to become a better presenter/trainer. I’m a work in progress. Part of that is writing up why I ultimately decided to pass on people who had low test scores. Her and TDH were trying to help me write something about someone’s test and TDH chose the word “sporadic” and me being on 4 hours of sleep and a horribly taken nap, said, “Don’t give me a word you can’t spell.” But he knew it was all in good humor. Then later my manager was telling me how the good part about teaching these classes is that we have a chance to sit down afterwards and make fun of people…she’s not a horrible person, just an honest one. I said, “Oh goody, my two favorite things, sitting and making fun of people.” Who cares that I wasn’t even lying.
Afterwards my manager was giving me feedback on how I did. I wasn’t too excited for it because I know that I still get through the class a little too fast, I asked her if we could make a “bad” sandwich, good stuff to start off and good stuff to finish with so that I could leave feeling good about myself. She said that she had good stuff to say and she wouldn’t have left the class to go work on other things if she didn’t think I could handle it (I personally think it’s because TDH had arrived). She did however say that she’s observed me twice and has seen an improvement and she’s very pleased with how well I am doing and she says that she can tell I’m getting more comfortable, also she said that I have a great rapport with the trainee’s, i.e. I’m friendly and help them to feel comfortable. It’s about the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me. I like the idea that I seem comfortable up in front of these classes. Three months ago I wasn’t getting up in front of groups and talking and now I’m doing it on a weekly basis, who would have thought it?

Chapter 22: Thirty, Flirty, and Thriving

So today I was sitting in the chapel a few minutes before church started and I looked over and saw one of my home teachers looking over and his tongue was hanging out of his mouth. It wasn’t a teasing sticking out of the tongue and part of me wonders if he even realized that he was sitting there with his tongue on the wrong side of his lips. It was more like he was opening his mouth for a doctor to take a look inside. We made eye contact while his tongue was out and I have to admit that I wasn’t quiet sure how to react. Should I smile? I mean, I’ve never been taught the etiquette for a situation like this. Also, just because this guy is my home teacher doesn’t actually mean that we know each other well. He’s been my home teacher for a couple of months and he’s only come over once. My innate mocking tendency was to stick my tongue out in the same fashion. But instead I broke eye contact and turned away. I kind of wish I had stuck my tongue out; at least we’d have something to talk about the next time he came over to teach us. As it turned out he was giving a talk today in church, so he was up on the stand during the whole first hour and several times we made eye contact, but I didn’t much feel the need to acknowledge it, I figure should we ever actually have something to say to each other I’ll just randomly stick my tongue out at him, or at least bring it up.
I’ve been asked to give a talk and so far my options are my favorite hymn and why it’s my favorite, or testimonies: how we gain, share, grow, etc. pretty much anything to do with testimonies. I was told that I could hold out for a different topic, and I think I’ll ask what’s on the agenda for the month of March. I can’t seem to figure out where I would go with testimonies and the hymn topic seems like it would involve a lot of personal stories and I’m not good at telling personal stories, at least not spiritual ones related to hymns.
Before Sunday school I was running around, not really doing anything but at the time I felt like I was. Anyway, I was stopped in the hall by this kid that I sort of knew while we were growing up. He’s mentally disabled and usually when he stops you to talk he is ranting about some topic of other. He always seems very angry, like at Christmas he was ticked because his mom bought him “The Hulk” on DVD but what he had asked for was “Spiderman” and boy was he ticked off about it. When I first passed him in the hall he had stopped a guy and was complaining about dating. To avoid anything on this topic I walked the long way back around them so that I wouldn’t have to pass them twice. But he got me later as I was walking by and started to tell me about how he was going to buy some dumbbells from Wal-Mart and beef up, and then his muscles would get huge. He asked if I liked the name Strongman or Muscle Man better. I told him Muscle Man. He went on saying that his muscles would get huge and he would be able to break someone’s neck with his arm. Luckily there was a member of the bishopric there who is new to the ward so he came over and introduced himself to me, thus pulling me away from Muscle Man and our interesting if not slightly disturbing conversation. We spoke to each other briefly, meanwhile Muscle Man kept bucking at guys who walked past and for some reason went to the tallest guys and asked if they wanted to take him on. I slipped past him as he threatened another passerby.
I passed the Enforcer (I think it’s been a while since I’ve talked about him. We are slowly becoming independent friends…meaning we don’t necessarily need my roommates there to be friends). Earlier he had told me to go to class and I told him that he needed to go. He said that he was going to make sure that the group we were standing with went to class. I told him that I remember how that worked out for him last time. He came to be the “Sunday School enforcer” and just ended up sitting with us in the foyer the whole time. When I passed him this time he was in the same place I left him so I got his attention and told him that he needed to get to class. He said that he couldn’t because he was the Sunday school secretary (or was it first counselor…I can’t remember) so he had to collect all the roles and therefore couldn’t actually attend Sunday school. I smiled and then leaned in and sniffed and said, “what’s that smell?” he sat there for a split second not sure where I was going with it, and I said, “Oh, its bull-crap.” He laughed and I told him I would see him later. I’m not really going to slight him for not going to Sunday school because as I walked away I was headed to my car to go eat Sunday dinner with my family. Maybe next Sunday I’ll go to Sunday school and take him down with me. But we’ll have to see when that day comes.

Chapter 21: What Am I?

Either the people in my life don’t know me, or I don’t know me. I’m not trying to prove a point here, I’m not trying to say that everyone in my life is oblivious to how I really am and I am right because it has to do with me. I easily could not know who I am. I could be in a funk and just not realize it.
Last night I hung out with my roommates. It doesn’t happen often and it is actually planned less. But last night was a planned get together. We were going to go see a movie, an early one because of my work schedule. I was going to meet them there and I had stopped by my happy place for about 15 minutes just to say ‘hi’ to some people. So I was running a little late to the movies. I drove around the entire parking lot, just so you know, it’s not just the parking lot for the movie theater, there’s Burger King, Barnes and Noble, Fridays, Skate Nation, American Family Fitness…and these are just the stores not connected the actual theater building. You have deli’s and ice-cream shops along the side. The parking lot itself is pretty big. So I am in my car looking for a spot while at the same time trying not to hit any pedestrians. Don’t even get me started on pedestrians. My roommates call me as I am attempting to make a left turn in this parking lot (on a Friday night I might add). Motor Mouth…being herself, is telling me in the most words possible what they are doing at that moment which basically is just that they were waiting in line at the kiosk to buy their tickets (the kiosk is faster then waiting in line outside, and warmer too). I finally told her that I was getting a horrible case of road rage and was going to hang up before I ended up yelling at her (I know my own limits). So I went to park in the far left hand corner of the store and preceded to work out in the freezing weather on my speed walk to the theater. When I get there my roommates are standing outside in the line and explain how the kiosk didn’t accept gift cards which are how they were going to pay for the tickets. We stand in line for a couple of minutes while I dramatically freaked out about my experience of trying to get a parking lot and asking if it was all really worth it. Then Motor Mouth sheepishly tells us that she just noticed that the movie we were going to go see was sold out. So I continue to freak out (not seriously freaking out, it’s just the way I am…or at the least the way I thought I was). At least Diva was laughing…she gets me.
So we go to Blockbuster to get a movie instead. They had a good sale going on (4 for $20). I was having trouble finding 4 movies that I didn’t already own or that I actually wanted to own. Motor Mouth kept pointing ones out to me or asking the group of us if any of us saw a particular one. She threw out one title and I said I didn’t like it, then she threw out another one and I said I didn’t finish it (I had started but got bored with it), so she says that she wasn’t ever going to ask me about movies because I’m too picky. I personally don’t see anything wrong with being picky about movies. I think you can trust people’s opinions about movies more if they are actually picky about them. My roommates are picky and I can’t stand half the movies they watch. I finally had 4 movies picked out but I looked that huge line and put the movies back. I said something about everyone in line being the movie theater rejects and Motor Mouth piped up that she wasn’t a reject and I looked at her and said, “Well you’re not in line are you?” She said it again later and I was half tempted to tell her that maybe she was just in denial. There are certain people who you have to remind that it isn’t always about them. We finally left and went to the store to get stuff to eat for dinner and decided to go to our friend’s house for a movie.
When we were there we were all in line to use her microwave to heat up our dinners. Jelly Bean beat me to it and I got an attitude with her (not a real one because I could seriously care less if I got the microwave first). Motor Mouth said I was on one. Every time I said something she asked if I had a bad day at work. I felt like telling her that this is just the way I am. (P.S. we watch a movie which was pretty okay, better then I expected at least…but I can’t figure out what all the fuss is with this Tatum Channing (SP?) guy).
Now, if this were an isolated incidence I wouldn’t suspect anything. I wouldn’t wonder if I didn’t know myself, know my own kinks and quirks. Because I truly believe that I am an over-reactor, I dramatize things to make life seem more interesting. Tonight however I went to my parents house to have dinner with my family and I was doing my normal thing (which I at least thought was my normal thing) I like to consider it the Jerry Seinfeld approach. The, “What’s up with that?!” approach to things that come my way. I speculated at how I got an anniversary check in February when my original anniversary was in April and my rehire one was in May. My mom pipes up that for someone who does training for the company I sure do a lot of complaining. This remark is what made me wonder if maybe I’m just not myself lately, but I am the only one who hasn’t noticed. Is that possible? If I’m not myself how do I get back to the way I was if I don’t think that I wasn’t that way? Make sense? I just want to know how I used to be…or how people perceived me as being so I can just go back to being what I was.

Chapter 20: Getting to Know You

Working in my new store I am easily surrounded by numerous people, whom I don’t know, but they have the opportunity to already know each other and I am just one new person. It would be nice to just met one new person at a time instead of a whole store. It is particularly unfair when some people’s eyesight are better than other people’s or that some people wear their nametags more clearly than others. People I am working with can act as though we’ve known each other for a while, which only makes me feel stupid because I have no clue what their name is. I can’t ask them what their name is if they are already on a first name basis with me. I’m slowly picking up on it though and yesterday while I was working I had a personal revelation, getting to know people, takes time. Making friends, takes time. I just had to remember that at some point all of my friends were strangers. Some of my friends I wasn’t even trying to be friends with and didn’t care if we ever spoke, but now they are my friends. In the words of Ben Folds, “Time takes time.” …deep. With the whole name thing, I’d rather you not say my name then call me the wrong one. Just a note.
I was a bit flustered in my plans to acclimate to the store with an experience that I had yesterday. When I first started in the store the trainer I took the place of told me that I was allowed to go into the office and make copies for my paper work. I went to the back to make copies yesterday and I was standing by the copy machine when a woman I haven’t met yet comes up and says, “Oh I can do that for you.” So I back up a bit (it was 4 copies and the 3rd one was coming out of the machine). She kind of stood between me and the copier and looked back at me a little. Then she handed me the copies and said in a hushed tone, “we’re not really suppose to have anyone back here.” What the crap? One thing I was worried about with this store was that the copier was in Customer Service and I didn’t want to have to get someone else to make my copies. It’s a waste of their time, especially if there are customers waiting for them, and especially if I have had a busy training week. Luckily everyone in their customer service is actually nice and doesn’t have a problem helping me out It just makes me wonder, what title do I have to get in the copy to earn the trust to be allowed to use the copier? I get my own office, I used the community room for my training, I have a manager card, what more do I need to get behind customer service and get a copy of something, or pick up my store mail? I need to find out who this chick is in customer service who doesn’t want me back there. Then I need to find out how much authority I have so that I can know whether to comply with her or to tell her to shove it.

Chapter 19: 11 Hours of My Life

So I worked with TDH again last night. It had been about three weeks since I’ve done the Cashier class at work so I was a bit rusty. I taught the morning class and he showed up while I was still setting up. He came into the lab as I finished and he was saying, “now this is how it’s suppose to be, I come in and all the work is done.” Slacker. Since we only had two people in the morning class (it’s still the slow season) I asked if he thought he was teaching the morning class…because I was, and frankly since I’ve been cheated out of sitting back and relaxing during the afternoon class I wasn’t about to give it up. He said that he didn’t think so and I explained that I thought maybe he thought he was and that’s why he was there so early. I showed him a copy of the e-mail our manager sent out about what time the second trainer should show up according to different situations. A class of less then 12 (or 2 in this case) the second trainer doesn’t need to come until 4:30. He debated whether or not to leave because our manager had already seen him and he knew she would know that he had been an idiot if he didn’t stick around. I told him it was fine if he did, I didn’t mind. He decided to sit in the back and work on other things to cover up his mistake rather then admitting that he didn’t pay attention to any of the e-mails. So 11:30 rolled around and if he’s there he’s suppose to greet my trainee’s so I looked at him and said, “Greeter! Get to it!” I didn’t really make him do it because seriously, two people? One of which was 5 minutes late and the other one didn’t have the proper uniform pants on. The class went pretty well though, I think I’ve gotten better at slowing myself down, we didn’t take our break until about an hour and 15 minutes in, which is about normal. At the break TDH decided to go home and take a nap, but he told me not to tell our manager unless she asked because he was a little embarrassed. She asked so I had to tell. She asked more than once too, when she first noticed that he was gone and then when she noticed that an hour and a half later he still wasn’t back. I at first had told her that he had decided to go on a break, when she asked the second time I said it was a long break.
Before TDH left though we were talking to one of my trainee’s and she said something about having a good afternoon and we told her we were still going to be there that night. TDH told her that there’s an evening class and he was teaching that and then I told her that I had to stick around to make sure that he got to his car safely at night. Which, upon reflection, that’s exactly what happened…I walked him to his car and then went to my car. Why am I the guy and he’s the girl?
As for my trainees, we had the bright, gregarious woman from South Boston (which is apparently still in Virginia, but I was thinking…Boston, Boston). Then we had the recent high school graduate who may have gone undiagnosed with A.D.D. for pretty much his whole life. He couldn’t keep his hands off of the mock groceries; he couldn’t seem to stay focused until I started to make sure I was making eye contact with him more. Kind of a, “I’ll be watching” thing. He started to focus, but he still kept grabbing the fake produce and playing with it. Then when I cut them loose he couldn’t really remember where much of the stuff was, but he finally started to get the hang of it. I get to work with him today…yippee. Wo, speaking of A.D.D. I just tried to find a synonym for “yippee” and it gives me “nowadays”, “at the moment”. I thought it was an expression of excitement. There is so much I don’t know about the English language.
Anyway, A.D.D.’s spastic tendencies transferred over to the register he was working on and I had to make him move. The register just kept printing out ‘z’s on the register tape, over and over until I finally took out the receipt tape.
So when TDH finally came back he asked how things went without him. I told him that as soon as he left the class was shot. The registers broke down and there was absolute mayhem. He almost believed me too. Then he was telling me how there was a table that was uneven and that everyone in the building was blaming him because he likes to sit on the tables. I said, “Didn’t you get that memo? Everything that goes wrong or gets messed up is supposed to be blamed on you.” I told him that if he sat in the exact center of the table then there shouldn’t be a problem.
He asked me about the book I had been reading earlier and we talked a little bit about it. I just finished the book Anthem in pretty much two days, it’s a short book though. I told him it was the typical failed Utopia, but I didn’t like it as much as 1984 and Brave New World and I also said that I’ve decided it’s because it wasn’t depressing enough. He said that he really liked 1984 but he hasn’t read a book since college. I told him that he should because it might help his spelling (mostly in a teasing manner). He laughed and said it probably would except that he reads phonetically, (and he spells phonetically too). Which is funny because if you read and write phonetically, then you can’t really spell or read that word. If you know how to read “phone” you say the ‘ph’ with an ‘fo” instead of a “fe” so you read the word “phone-ti-cally”. Doesn’t sound a thing like phonetic. Anyway, it’s like why does the word ‘lisp’ have the ‘sp’ that makes it so hard for people with lisp to even say their condition.
We sat in the room for a good ten to fifteen minutes while he wrote up about one of his trainees. He asked me how to spell “bakery” and “opinion”, I helped him with “opinion” but I just looked at him and said, “bakery?” with a “are you serious?” attitude.
As usual TDH tried to type up some e-mails at the end of the night. I corrected a misspelled word or two and then I apologized but spell check would catch those and he told me it’s good to catch them, so right away I pointed out that he had spelled position “p-o-s-s-i-t-i-o-n”. Then I just kept pointing things out. Later he was trying to decide if what he wrote should say “Kitchen Deli” or “Kitchen/Deli” so he just kept saying it. It made me laugh and I told him that it sounded like he short circuited. At one point he was doing something (this is all the same e-mail and it took a good 20 minutes) I just leaned back in my chair and laughed and said that this was my favorite part of the day.
I mentioned something about my office, because I know he’s jealous and I told him how I have a magnet, and some pictures, and he says, “I know I saw the pictures”. To which I replied, ‘You’ve been in my office?!” He had training there the other day so he was in my office doing paperwork. I asked if he saw my turtle and I told him the story behind it (Crunchy gave me the two turtles because we were suppose to run a marathon together and we never did. And I told him when I got a desk job I would take the turtle that represented him and put it on my desk). So I told TDH that I made the goofiest turtle him and now it’s on my desk.
When we went to sign out (because we are there after hours) I asked him what time it was so I could write it down, he said 10 (I had been there since 10:30 that morning) so I wrote “10:00” and then said, “Thank you, TDH., without you I could have gone home at 9:20 and missed out on so much.” He just laughed, which is good because I don’t mean to hurt his feelings, I don’t mind getting paid while he writes e-mails and I proofread them. I wonder if he knows that he is pretty much my best friend.
I’ve decided to change the meaning of the “h” in TDH’s name, instead of ‘handsome’ I’m going with ‘hot’ because while he is extremely good looking, he is not rivaling with Harrison Ford in “Indiana Jones” but rather an Abercrombie and Fitch bag.

Chapter 18: Stressed Out

All signs point to the fact that I am stressed, yet as I think about my life I can’t pin-point my stress. In all my waking hours I don’t feel stressed (having a little bit of a hot flash right now but I don’t equate that to stress). Some people say that if you lose a lot of hair while you are in the shower (washing your hair) then it’s a sign that you are stressed…or that you have a serious medical condition and you should get yourself an appointment with your doctor. The other signs of stress appear in your dreams; Dreams that involve lack of control, murder attempts, etc.
To start off this past Friday night I had a dream that I was married and my husband was trying to kill me. He had kidnapped me and taken me to a work picnic. We were inside a house and he had a friend there too. I was scared but I was looking out the window at all the people coming to the picnic, they were a bunch of big wigs in the company, most people from corporate and some store managers. I saw the store manager of my new work location and I overheard my husband tell his friend that she would be the perfect eye-witness, thus being the worse person to see me alive at the picnic. So I ran to the window and opened it and started to yell her name as loud as I could. I kept screaming it until she finally looked up. When she did I waved at her and started to climb out the window and unto the deck. I asked her how she was and just tried to make small talk to. Then I started to climb down the deck to get closer to the crowd of people. My defeated husband and his friend went to the car and I watched them drive away but the people that were surrounding me also started to head to their cars and I watched as his truck turned around. I grabbed my cell phone and called 9-1-1, my connection wasn’t the greatest but I told the dispatcher that my husband was trying to kill me and she asked if this was an emergency. Frustrated I told her that it was and I was crying as I told her that he was turning the car around and coming for me and I asked her to please help…then I woke up.
The next night I was married again, but to Coz (who isn’t really a cousin remember so I’m not living out some West Virginian fantasy here) and he was trying to kill me. I remember that I was pretending to be asleep on the couch and I had a steak knife in my hand to attack should he come near. I started off with my eyes slightly open so I could see his silhouette in the darkened room. He was leaning in the doorway and I was gripping my knife but then my eyes shut and for the life of me I couldn’t get them to open. It was so scary because I knew he was coming closer but I couldn’t see him coming and I had my knife but what good would it do if I didn’t know where he was?
I woke up from that one a little unresolved as well.
Then the next night, there were no attempts on my life but I was pregnant and about to pop and I had a deadline instead of a due date. I was with my family and we were going to move that night so I was suppose to pack up all my stuff, go have the baby and then we would go. But it took me forever to pack up, as I was packing I kept looking through the stuff and pretty much just taking up a lot of time, so I tried to tell someone that I didn’t think it was going to happen that day. I also didn’t feel like the baby would come that day even if I did pack up in time. It wasn’t so much the subject matter of the dream but the feeling of being late for something, and I was scared that I would be in trouble for not packing up and having my baby that day.
In addition to all this while I was taking my shower today a lot of hair came out (I don’t have bald spots but you know what I mean). I don’t know if it’s just me or if other people have this problem, but all signs point to “stressed” but I can’t see what the stress is. I shouldn’t be having dreams where I am fighting for my life or worried because I won’t have a baby on time. I want these dreams to stop and my sister tells me it’s because I’m stressed out and if I can’t see what it is that’s stressing me how am I suppose to stop it? Maybe I drink too much milk, but I haven’t been drinking that at night so it shouldn’t still be in my system by the time I go to bed. It will be interesting to pinpoint my stress in the next couple of days.

Chapter 17: Bittersweet

So I had my last day at the store. I worked a 9 hour shift and tried not to think that this would be the last time that I worked with the people that I have grown so close to over the last six or seven months. Not even just them, this was my high school job, I’ve worked with some of these people for almost 8 years. Many of them remember what I was like when I was just 16 years old.
You have Maps who always notices my haircut even when I haven’t gotten one, The Motivator who believes that I will do great things (wish I had her faith in me), Wheezy who to me will always be a 16 year old kid even though he’s 23 and getting ready to go to law school. Wiggum who is probably the most dramatic boy I have ever met and may be even more dramatic than most girls I know. Poof Daddy who I wouldn’t even talk to at first and now I talk to every time I go to the store; Steel Eyes, who I used to be afraid of for no particular reason and all my other boys who accepted me so quickly even if I didn’t want them to. Even the ones I don’t get along with as well will still be missed.
I was doing okay, the whole day I was fine. Then suddenly I’m off of work. The Motivator comes over to say ‘goodbye’ and how nice it’s been working with me on and off for the past 7 or so years and then I’m still doing okay with not crying and suddenly she asks if she can have a hug. Of course she can have a hug, so I give her one. Big mistake, I start crying, a customer even points it out! The nerve! So I blame the Motivator for ruining the last 9 hour record I had of not crying. I went over to café to say goodbye to my friend whom I will call Anguish because one day he just kept telling me how much his soul hurt but he wouldn’t talk about why and then the next time I saw him things were better. I hid in the café while Anguish made sure no one could see me. Bulldog came over though and told me not to leave because he had something for me.
While I was waiting for Bulldog to come back Poof Daddy came over and Anguish, him and I were talking. I told them I was such a girl because I was crying. It’s not like I would never come back to visit. Poof said it was hard though because it was like I was leaving my family. That didn’t make it any better. Bulldog finally came back with balloons and a cake. I was a little embarrassed; I mean I was going to have to walk out of the store with a heck of a lot of balloons. So Poof and another coworker carried my stuff out to the car. With the display I’m pretty glad that I had decided to start and tell people that I was leaving so that it wasn’t a surprise to everyone. I cried a little on the way home, sometimes you’ve got to eek out every last tear.
Poof Daddy was right though, we are like a little family. So in a way it’s like I was leaving my family, and to me at the moment it felt like it was going to be for forever. With the training that I have been able to do for the company I have had the opportunity to go to many different stores and none have quite been like this one. The people haven’t been as close. Some people don’t like the idea that we are all up in each other’s business and we know so many details about each other, but we care about each other too. We can be horribly honest with each other, pick on each other, and just plain mean to each other but if someone else (especially customers) try to mess with them then we all get angry. It’s hard to find that type of relationship, especially in your work environment. It so much like that of siblings. We lend to each other a little piece of ourselves. The teenagers lend us their youth, the older employees lend us their knowledge, and some just teach us to have a little compassion with each other, the managers teach by example the value of hard work and see within all of us our potential for the lives we are beginning to lead. The job itself may not be the greatest but it’s the dynamics of our workplace that makes it so hard to leave.

Chapter 16: Some Things need to Run Out of Gas

We all know how I feel about talking. Tonight out of the kindness of my heart and a desire to get along with Motor Mouth I made a huge mistake and asked how her speech went today for her public speaking class. Not only did I actually have to listen to the four minute long speech (because her teacher made them all record their speeches so that they could listen to them later) but then she went on for a good 45 minutes rarely taking a breath. What was she talking about you may ask…and my only response is good question. There was some major stream of consciousness going on, and I’ve determined that the stream is only fun when two or more people are in on it. Having to listen to someone paddle down an overly emotional stream of consciousness is boring and honestly makes you light headed. I believe that the phrase, “for the love of all that is holy make her stop,” slipped in and out of my mind several times.
It’s worse when she comes to my room and knocks on my door, only to hold me captive as she rambles about the most random, and not even fun topics. The worst feeling is wondering how long you are going to be forced to sit there standing by the door with your hand on the doorknob waiting until you can finally close it and life can continue on. No matter how boring my life is, it’s still my life and wasted moments unfortunately will never be able to be collected to be used on something more valuable.
It’s because of this that I worry about myself. I hope that I am not someone’s Motor Mouth. I want to learn to listen to other people and pay attention to whether they are trying to get in a word, or if they are trying to escape. I already apologize to people when I feel that I have dominated the conversation and bored them and people always say that they don’t mind, or that they like it…people lie. The world would be a better place if people didn’t feel the need to spare other people’s feelings. I feel the need to insert a disclaimer here because I know that I am one of those people who feel the need to spare other people’s feelings, I just wish that I wasn’t, and that it was okay to be that way and to treat others that way. We’re supposed to be honest, I’m just trying to make the world a better place. To have a little blast from the past Spam has been giving me some trouble lately. She’s the eerie combination of Thorn and The Antagonizer. Today she put a welt on my nephew’s forehead. She didn’t intend to hit his head, but she certainly intended to tackle him to the ground despite the fact that all the adults in her life have told her time and time again not to do that. How many times does someone have to be told something before it finally sticks? She bumped her head on the way down and of course expected all the attention and was disappointed when she didn’t get any but negative. All she could say (one of her world famous phrases) was, “I didn’t mean to.” If I had a nickel for every time that she has said, “It’s not my fault” or “I didn’t mean to” I wouldn’t need to work. Please, for the love, someone start paying me for that. Today it reminded me of an experience that I had with The Antagonizer. I believe that I have written about it before, she bumped into me and I said something about her bumping into me and she said that she didn’t see me…which I guess means she didn’t think that it should be her fault. I kept trying to tell her that regardless of whether or not she saw me, she still bumped into me. Very frustrating. The part where she reminds me of Thorn…is how she is so self-centered. She hurt my nephew but she is expecting everyone to fawn all over her. In retrospect maybe the similarities are not in their personalities per se but the fact that all three are immature. Spam is only 8, Thorn probably stopped her emotional maturity at age 13 when her mom died, and Antagonizer with her history probably was emotionally stunted. This deficiency really is through no fault of their own…maybe knowing this will help me to deal with people like this better…at least on days that I am feeling up to the task of being a better person.

Chapter 15: Find a Happy Place

So I’m in love with a 17 year old. I feel as guilty as the fifth grader on my elementary school bus who proclaimed that she liked a 3rd grader. Oddly enough that seems more pedophilic to me then a 24 year old liking a 17 year old; even though their age difference was probably 3 to 4 years max. I’ve decided, or maybe the word I’m looking for is consoled myself to the point where I actually believe it’s okay, and I’m not really that ashamed. Yet, I guess I still feel guilty because I keep wondering why I would like a 17 year old. I’ve ultimately decided that I’m deprived of attention from the opposite sex, and since my dating pool sadly consists of either drinkers or metros I’m dipping into the younger dating pool, the manly men/boys who you still have to force to watch chick flicks as opposed to those who get together in groups and watch “The Notebook” or “Titanic”.
I guess being in love with a 17 year old is balanced by the fact that the human heart (or at least mine) has the capacity to love more then one person and I am also in love with someone my own age. He’s a drinker though, and probably has no interest in me, but the more time I spend with him the more I absolutely adore him. Even though he tells me a bit too much personal information involving his bowels and he wipes his nose with his hand a lot, and I’m a bit of a germ-a-phobe. Keep in mind here I am using the word “love” extremely loosely, the appropriate word is probably “adore” but in context it seemed to make me sound like a doting mother instead of a disturbed young adult. There you have it, the story of my life. I am always attracted to people that I can never have. I still haven’t deduced whether this is a subconscious thing or a conscious personal attack on my happiness. Part of me thinks that it is a subconscious fear of commitment to another human being so the most attractive people to me are the ones who don’t want any commitment from me.
I told my roommate that I need a boyfriend to fill the empty hours; because again, last night I went to the store and hung out for about two hours. I wasn’t going to go until later but I was oddly getting depressed at my parent’s house, so I left and went to my happy place. I stalked Baby Face as usual and found him and Steel Eyes in the locker room stealing Puppy Love’s skateboard from his unlocked locker. They almost peed their pants when I came around the corner, of course I actually didn’t know that they were in the locker area and I was going to make sure I had all of my stuff out of mine. So we sat and talked for a bit, both boys were suppose to be working but it was really slow so they decided to pick on other associates. I asked Steel Eyes if he had a court date (he got arrested by a truancy officer…oh sorry, detained by a truancy officer. He was handcuffed, I consider that an arrest). Oh, and Baby Face and Steel Eyes were trying to guess my age. Steel Eyes said “19” then Baby Face said “24” then he started to rapidly go down “23, 22, 21, 20”. Then he asked “which one is it, 20 or 21?” I just said, “Yes”. Then they kept pressing me so I said, “30”. They wouldn’t believe me and finally decided that I was 21 and asked if I would buy them alcohol. I told them I wouldn’t buy alcohol for minors (or ever really) and Baby Face says, “I’m not a minor, I’m 18.” I called him on it. I know his age, I’m very aware of his age.
Finally I went to talk to Jaq about getting some hours later this week. Then I started to talk to my friend at customer service and it was her break so I decided to eat dinner with her. We decided to go outside even though it was probably about 30 degrees or so. We sat at the café tables and tried to act like we weren’t freezing, but hey, we were living on the edge. Baby Face had finally got to work, collecting store trash. He came to get the trash from the outside café area and was a little surprised to see people braving the weather. So he sat down with us and we started a conversation. I threw two pieces of nasty popcorn chicken towards the trash and missed and Baby Face told me that it was a hazard, someone might slip on it. My friend (Tipsy) agreed to it but said that Baby Face should have to pick it up because I was a customer. He stated one of the Core Behaviors that I have to teach all the time in my training and I told him good job and asked if he could remember all five and he started to name the values. I told him they were the values but he could have at it and name them too. So he starts and my friend is trying to think of them too and they got “Be helpful, Be safe, Be honest” and the fourth one is Be Hardworking and I interjected at this point and said, “Be Good Looking, which we three have down.” I don’t know why I said it, but it just came out and we all got a good laugh at it. I said in my training I would change the fourth one to “be good looking” and that way we would have an elite group working for us. Consider me the grocery store Hitler. We were joking around that I would kick people out of training if they weren’t, or maybe even give them the number of a plastic surgeon if I felt that much was needed.
Then I went inside and my “best friend” as I call her at work was going on break so I went with her and we talked upstairs. It’s funny what she puts up with when she hangs out with me, because the word she uses the most with me is, “Focus.” But she keeps talking to me! This is why she is my best friend at work. Baby Face confronted me about leaving the store and I didn’t deny it. I didn’t deny it last week when I told Steel Eyes and another guy that I would be leaving by the end of the month but at the time they didn’t seem to believe me. Steel Eyes ultimately must have because he’s the one who told Baby Face I was leaving. In a way I like that they were talking about me, it shows they care, either that or that they are shameless gossips which I find a difficult characteristic to believe in teenage boys, but I could be wrong.
Later Best Friend and I were talking after her break (I told you I was there for about 2 hours) and Baby Face came back up and I said, “This is my other best friend at work.” He seemed dejected for some reason, I think it’s what Best Friend said to him but I can’t recall what it was that she said, so I patted him on the back and that seemed to cheer him up. Best Friend and I were talking about people we know in Iraq and I told her how my brother-in-law is in a sniper group and Baby Face heard and said that he wanted to be on S.W.A.T. but then he said he never could be because he wasn’t the brightest. I’m now determined to find out what he has to do to be on S.W.A.T. I also reminded him that we never went shooting; he says that we have to set up a time to do that. Right now though, with the weather, I don’t think I want to sit outside shooting a gun while my toes go numb. Maybe some time during his spring break when the weather is getting warmer. This is one of those times when Best Friend pulled out a “focus” to get my attention back. I’ve begun a poll to see how many girls have seen the movie “The Notebook” because I am pretty sure I am the only girl who hasn’t, and oddly, it’s a fact I’m reasonably proud of. Oh, just so you know that’s where Best Friend and mine’s conversation veered off to.
Also Best Friend and I decided that Steel Eyes was a girl and he heard us and turned around and said, “I am a girl, and you both are just jealous.” Then he tried to saunter off swaying his hips back and forth but he just looked like a duck waddling away. Best Friend and I were laughing and I said that he didn’t really do it that well and she said thank goodness he didn’t because then you would really begin to wonder.
Later I was talking to Baby Face when I realized that Steel Eyes and this other girl at work were playing “rock, paper, scissors” to decide who would take the order out that they just finished. Steel Eyes won, meaning that the girl had to take it out and I was laughing because sometimes I make my trainees play that game. He said he always wins because he is the champion. So he played everyone in a quick game, best of three, and he kept winning. When he had competed against everyone else I stepped up to the plate. In other words, I brought my A-game. I ended up winning the “rock, paper, scissors” contest and defeated the undefeated. Is there any question why this place is my happy place?

Chapter 14: Change

Update quickly, I’ve lost Baby Face too. Well, I didn’t lose him, he’s still at the store, but he went over to produce department. So he’s as good as lost. Also I am switching over to full time. The other trainer has made it official and I am supposed to call my manager today and that’s what she is going to tell me. I have to act like I didn’t already know all the details because Bulldog let it slip yesterday. I had talked to Bulldog about how I may be going to full time but I didn’t know the details (this was three days ago). Yesterday he got the call from my manager and thought that was funny because we just talked about it. He told me my last day in the store and everything. It’s bittersweet at best. I mean, one of the trainer’s is leaving and she’s done a lot to help me feel welcome into this little “elite” group, and I’m leaving my store I won’t be working in that store anymore and I won’t even be training for that store, I won’t be training in any of the stores I love. That’s all the bitter…the sweet part is a pay increase, a guaranteed 40 hours a week, and holiday pay. Oh yeah, and a desk, with a filing cabinet. Training is just a lonely job and I was able to counteract it with working in the store every once in a while with my friends. I’m just going to have to force myself to hang out with my roommates and their friends for a little social interaction.
Not the point here…I just needed to update. I really wanted to write about my weird dream, which is why I updated about Baby Face but updates always lead to more updates. The dream last night was weird but real, and I think you know what I mean. So I was at my parent’s house and it apparently was Halloween because Spam and Burrito were really excited to go trick-or-treating. My sister and her husband were there and we were doing something at the kitchen table, I can’t remember what though. Suddenly Baby Face was there and he was acting all excited to go trick or treating…it was like he was making fun of Spam and Burrito, but I couldn’t be certain. Both of the kids wanted me to take them trick-or-treating and I didn’t want to, but then Baby Face said that it would be fun and so I think I decided that I would but later in the dream I looked out the back door and Baby Face and Burrito were down the street already. I went to grab my camera to take a picture because Baby Face had Burrito’s backpack on. Note to reader: Burrito is the typical 6 year old, so his backpack is small and would look funny on an adult, and in addition it’s pockets are differentiated by each one being a different primary color. Thus the camera. I was at the kitchen table trying to get the camera and my dad was at the table working on finances or something like that and I had a bunch of stuff spread on the table (probably for work) so I started to organize it and put it in my work notebook so that he wouldn’t accidentally mess with them. By the time I got my camera from my purse and returned to the window they were out of sight, so I went to find my shoes. While I was doing this I realized that they didn’t take Spam along and I figured this was to get Burrito finished with his trick-or-treating before it got dark…either that or Spam (as in real life) was taking too long to get her costume together so they went on without her with plans to come get her later.
Suddenly I found myself walking down the street and I seem to know all my neighbors, because as I pass their houses I know who lives in each one. It was eerie because I have had dreams walking down that same street and before too long my brother would come speeding down in a monster truck and he would be trying to hit me. I haven’t had that dream in a long time, and luckily he didn’t show up in the dream, and no monster truck did either. But I lost Baby Face and Burrito. Hello! Interpretation please!
I should probably go call my manager and try to sound excited over the phone. I just don’t get too excited about many things. I’m happy, but I’m not good at outwardly expressing it all the time. I just give most things a smile and that’s about it, I’m not all about the “Oh great!” And what am I suppose to say to my manager? All I can think to say is, “Oh, ok”. Because seriously, it’s not something I’m going to be too excited about considering that the other trainer has to leave in order for me to have it. I’ve never been power hungry so getting this position isn’t really doing it for me. It’s pleasant, and that’s the only way I know how to react to it. I did the same thing when I got the position I currently hold. People had to ask me if I was happy about it or if I was excited about it. Hey, at least when I’m really excited, you’ll know, because I don’t put on the show for just anything!

Chapter 13: Pink Slips

I found out some pretty devastating news tonight. Of course, it’s only upsetting when I actually think about it, but all the other moments I don’t feel like it really happened. I called my store tonight to talk to my manager about getting hours next week and I told her I understood that they may not have a lot of hours but I would like some if they could give me any. She said that they actually had a bunch because they had to let someone go. “Letting someone go” doesn’t happen very often so she had to repeat it because for a second I didn’t understand what she meant. Then it clicked. I asked who but she said she wasn’t actually allowed to tell, which I didn’t realize otherwise I wouldn’t have asked her. But she did end up telling me when the other manager left the customer service area. She swore me to secrecy and warned me that she could lose her job because she told me so I’d better not tell anyone. I swore that I wouldn’t tell anyone (writing in here is okay and since I can’t tell anyone I’ve got to get it out somewhere, this is big for me). It turns out that The Warrior has been let go. I’m not sure why he has been let go but for some reason I feel like it is because of an honesty issue, that’s the only thing you don’t get a second chance on in this company. This just hits more then the other kids at work because The Warrior and I even started the same day (well my day back to the company after a two year break…but still the same first day). I was seriously shocked, of all the people I didn’t expect him, of course I honestly didn’t really expect anyone, she said that I would find out sooner or later who it was and honestly I didn’t really think it would be anyone in particular. I don’t know why I didn’t even wonder, or think of a name.
When I hung up with her (I called while on break from training) I was sitting there and my trainee’s had both decided to sit upstairs with me on their break I looked across the table and told them that I wasn’t going to tell them. I knew they wanted to know what we had been talking about but they weren’t going to find out. They laughed. Humor is my way to deal with things and I tried to keep myself busy but we sat there for a second and no one was talking. I stared at my work notebook and it started to sink in.
The Warrior is one of my most favorite people at work and it’s going to pretty much suck without him there. In a way it’s made my decision to accept the promotion a lot easier. The Warrior’s “Release” kind of opened my eyes to who else may be gone without my noticing, and there’s an older man who works(ed) there and I hadn’t seen him in a while, upon investigation I found out that he had been let go as well. Then there was another girl who quit, but her dismissal wasn’t far away to begin with.

Chapter 12: Hunger Pains

Tonight when I was at work TDH was there too. He was just working in the store as a cashier and I was training. We worked together yesterday and he was telling me about how he hasn’t been feeling well lately. He did a “T.M.I.” (Too much information) yesterday and told me pretty much all about it. I told him to go to a doctor and he said that if he didn’t feel well by the end of the week he would go in. So I said, “hmm, one more day” seeing as today was the end of the week. So he went this morning. He’s not aloud to eat anything solid; he has to just drink liquids for 36 hours. So I clasped my hands together and said, “I think on my break I will go get…” I was going to say hamburger but I didn’t really want to make him suffer and I worried that naming food would just take him over the edge. Considering he hasn’t been able to hold on to anything he’s eaten in about a week I just couldn’t let myself be that cruel.
Later one of the ladies from accounting was upstairs when we both were and she said, “Ya’ll look alike” and I thought she said, “They all look alike.” A curse of the Southern dialect is that Southerners are lazy enough with their words as is, but a group of people over the number of two is referred to as “ya’ll”. I suppose it’s not really a curse, but sure does make it hard to understand them sometimes. I can refer to them as “them” because while I may be natural born Southerner, I don’t really have the drawl, at least most of the time. So in response to what she said, I said, “The trainees?” Because well, today I started to train the wrong person. They do all look alike. I was telling him how to bag and then he did a frustration sigh and I realized he wasn’t my trainee, he was one of the baggers. I felt bad but at the same time, if he had been doing it right, I wouldn’t have had to say anything. Still a little embarrassed, and the kid may hate me now…but I’ll be over it by the end of the week. Anyway, back to the story, so she said, “No, ya’ll” I said, “Is it because I look like a boy?” She ignored my question and TDH said, “Well, maybe because the dark hair, etc. We look like we could be brother and sister.” Okay, this is my second long lost brother in a month, it’s getting creepy. So she asks if we are brother and sister, because I suppose the training department thinks it would be cute to hire siblings. We both say, “no” and then she asks, “Is he your boyfriend?” That leaves the question solely to me. Not a problem answering since we haven’t even gone on a date so it’s not like we were at a confusing part of a relationship and I didn’t want to say ‘yes’ if he thought ‘no’. But for some reason I didn’t like the question being directed at me. The way you answer a question like that could affect the answer to a question like that. If that makes sense. What kind of tone did you use when you said ‘no’? You know? Anyway, it doesn’t matter really, but I just worry about people reading into things.
Anyway, TDH decided to finally go home and rest (even though the doctor told him to go home today and rest, not go into work). He said it was hard getting through his four hour day…you know, feeling weak and all. It’s tough being anorexic