Feeling Miserable

People never really look at what they look at do they? I always want to laugh when my customers rearrange letters in something they are ordering. Like the Asiago Pretzel becomes the "Asagio" pretzel or the Vivanno becomes the "Vivianno." It amazes me how very little people pay attention to the world around them. Sometimes I don't pay attention. We all get wrapped up in our own little lives, our own heads...
I'm sick. I never get sick, but yesterday I woke up with a sore throat and couldn't breath very good out of my nose. So, I was drinking Jasmine tea with honey, eating cough drops like they're M&Ms, and running bottles of geranium oil and cedarwood oil beneath my nose. (Aromatherapy) I had trouble sleeping last night, tossing and turning. Got up a few times. Opened a bottle of Lavender, inhaled deeply, and went to sleep. Almost didn't get up for work.
Four hour shift. On a Saturday morning. I'm good with that. Then I have church at 5:30. Kevin, one of the cafe regulars, invited me a long while back, and I finally went last Saturday. I'm going today with my sister. Church is held in an old building in St. Louis. It's also a cafe. Crave Cafe. The money from the cafe goes to keeping the church going. Beautiful place. I love it.
Then tonight is a birthday party. Theme: werewolves. Erin going to the party with me as well, if we decide to go. I feel like crap and if I went, I wouldn't stay long, don't want to pass this bug around to everyone else. I'm kinda light-headed and dizzy. I think I'm going to lie down for a while.
I will survive....I hope.

Customers and Gas Stations

I had a little older lady customer today who stood there for about fifteen minutes trying to decide what to get. In the end, she bought the one, little book she had in her hand. She kept mumbling things like, "I'd have a sandwich if I hadn't been eating so much cheese. I have three cheese dishes at home. What's in this sandwich?" She pointed to the Roasted Tomato Caprese.
"Tomatos, cheese, pesto..." I told her.
"Do you have homemade soup?"
Homemade? Seriously? Sure, fresh this mornin'. I got here at four a.m. to peel potatoes.
I pointed to the soup sign above the sandwiches. "That's our soup of the day." It was potato and Leek.
"I'd have a bowl of soup, but it has all that cheese..."
It has potatoes, leeks, and carrots in a creamy broth. Where does the sign say cheese, I wondered.
"Well, where are your healthy drinks?"
Well, we don't have 5o-calorie mango-banana smoothies chalk-full of vitamins and antioxidents, but we do have two sugar-free flavors. *smile, smile*
I was too terrified to mention the vivanno, which is as close to healthy as we get. So, instead I asked, "Hot or cold?" Naturally I was hoping she'd go with a hot drink, with it being about twenty degrees outside.
"Hot."
Good.
"Are you wanting something low-calorie?" Low-calorie is all we can do. Coffee isn't particularly healthy. Besides, we're a cafe, not a health food restaurant.
"Yeah," She said, all the while I'm wondering why. She's skinny, she's old. Why worry about calories?
"Well, we can make any of the hot drinks with skim. We also have two sugar-free flavors. Vanilla and caramel. You could get a sugar-free, skim latte."
"Hmm..." She stared at the menu behind me another few minutes then wandered back to the bake case. "I'd have soup, but..."
She glanced up at the posters of enlarged food pictures next to the menu.
"What's in the Roasted Tomato Sandwich?" She asked.
Ummm...Tomatos?
"That's the same sandwich you were looking at in the case there," I informed her politely, pointing toward the plastic replica in the bake case.
"Oh." She set her book on the counter. "I'm just going to get this. Can I pay for it here?"
"Sure!" I told her, relieved she was finally leaving.
It was a book about calories, and I had to stop myself from groaning out loud.
My next customer knew exactly what she wanted, was happy and pleasant. And, as I was making her drink- a venti, non-fat latte- I glanced outside at the brilliant sunshine. I normally hate sunshine, I prefer gray, storm clouds. But I knew it was freezing out there- even though, under my layers of black clothing, I was about to have heat stroke- and the sun shining off the mounds of frozen-solid snow was beautiful. I smiled and felt happy. For a moment, just one tiny fraction of time, I was almost my old self again. But I handed over her drink, and the feeling passed, the depression came back to cover my heart once more.
To change the subject, a couple of days ago I stopped at On The Run to fill up my gas tank. As I climbed out of my green Ford, I glanced over to my right. I could have sworn that the person a few pumps over was a friend of mine from high school. He looked exactly like Andrew. But, I was uncertain. It was a bright day, I had on sunglasses, his head was at an angle, so I shrugged it off and stepped inside to pre-pay. My jaw dropped, literally. Was that Josh at the register? Andrew's twin brother? I was completely weirded out. He glanced at me, but I was still unsure. It has been about five years since I have seen them, after all. I pay for my gasoline at the second register and go back to my car, all the while openly staring. As I am about to get in my car, the Josh doppleganger drives past me, he is also staring at me. I went to work. That was all. Maybe I should have said something, but I honesltly thought I was seeing things. This wasn't the first time I've thought I've seen old friends.
I had a customer give me a compliment today. A lady paid for her coffee with a gift card. The dange thing was being extremely difficult. I finally got it to work by putting in the long number on the back of the card. That was the last of the gift card. She asked me to throw it away, so I tossed it across the cafe toward the trash can, and I missed. I missed a lot. It bounced off the rolly cart and landed on the floor near the frap fridge.
I started laughing. "I have really bad aim."
She laughed too, and said, "Good thing you're a barista and not a basketball player."
"I thought about it once, but only because of my grandpa."
My grandpa holds the world record for most consecutive free throws. He never played professional ball, but he did write a book on free throws. Look him up. Ted St. Martin.
Anyway, I gave her her mocha and get the next customer's tall coffee. As I hand it to him, he tells me, "Your job suits your personality." He smiled and wandered away. You know, I do believe I was made for this job. After being an author, of course.
I was telling a freind yesterday, "If I ever open my bookstore, we'd go to work in pajamas and kick off our shoes and leave them off all day. And if customers are rude, my employees can be rude right back." Of course, Kevin told me I'd have no customers then. So? If someone is unnecessarily rude to an employee, I'm not going to make them smile and be polite. Who cares if that person comes into my store again or not? I don't really want want rude people shopping there anyway. Go ahead, tell the bitch off. My behavior will only mirror yours. Like Dime Lady at the DG. I wasn't taking that crap. And I think I would have customers. Not only the nice ones who aren't complete asses, but ones who also work in retail and know all about these evil customers. I would shop where employees had this freedom. If I were rude to them, I would want them to be just as rude back, put me in my place, knock me off my high horse. Just how I feel, is all.
I would love to own my own bookstore someday. I've actually planned it all. I would only sell children's books, teen books. Only one's I have read and like. I don't want people spending money on bad books, after all. And, though I don't really want to sell coffee in my store, I'd have to have a cafe in the corner. Yes, in a children's bookstore. Mom grabs a mocah while her child reads a book. My sister Carrie will run the cafe, that's all her. We even have a name picked out. Our store would be called Scotch Tape and Happy Beans. Scotch Tape for the bookstore because at Christmastime, nothing smells better than scotch tape. In July I can pick up a roll, press it against my nose, and I'm reminded that the evil heat coming off the pavement will be gone the second winter comes round again. It smells like gift wrapping and cold. Weird? Absolutely, but I love it. And coffee beans are always happy. Happy Beans.
I had a customer, a huge woman with black, curly hair and two chins. She walked up with a short man with facial hair. I smile at them. They ignore me. They mumble amongst themselves, then I hear her say, "It's not pumpkin cheesecake." And they walk away.
Well, It's not Fall.
Another, older, couple came up. The woman asked, "Do you have fountain soda?"
"No..." But before I could finish what I was about to say, she turns to the man with her, who is retreating ouf of cafe. They say something to one another, then she turns back to me.
"Do you have fountain soda?"
Once again I tell her no. "The only soda we have is in the beverage case."
She looked. "I don't see any soda."
That's because I'm lying.
"The IBC."
She makes a face. "Root Beer."
Yeah. And, if you look closely, your almost blind eyes will notice there is also Diet Root Beer, Black Cherry, and Cream Soda.
"So you don't have fountain soda?"
"No."
She walks away.
"Go to a gas station," I mutter under my breath to her back.

My Story, Part Three

“Come on, it’ll be dark soon,” Melissa headed out the door and toward the corner.
Mom always said they lived in the best location possible. Right on the corner was Roxbury, where they lived. Across the field from them was Roxhill, their elementary school. Across the street Fred Meyer, a gas station, and their doctor’s office. The doctor was getting very old, and whenever they had to see him, Mom always reminded Laura to speak up and breathe loudly so he could hear. Even with the stethoscope, he had trouble hearing.
Laura hated doctors, hospitals, any thing associated with them. She had asthma, and lots of memories of waking up in the night, wheezing, unable to breathe. Mom would have to pile her in the car and take her to the emergency so they can put her on the breathing machine. Sometimes, and this made Mom mad, the drive was enough to help Laura’s lungs work properly. The drive was always calm, quiet, peaceful, and it calmed Laura down and she could breathe again. Mom hated arriving at the emergency room with her breathing fine. Like a false alarm.
Laura also remembered the time she’d had her tonsils take out. She had to stay the night at the hospital. There was a vague image in her head of seeing her family right before the surgery, but it was really fuzzy. She’d been sitting in a wheelchair, drugged up on who knows what, and there they were. It was like in the movies, when they put Vaseline on the edges of the camera to make it look like it glowed. That’s the snapshot in her head. A fuzzy, glowing family.
Maybe that was after the surgery. She didn’t remember. But she didn’t have much trouble breathing anymore. Mom told her that she’d almost died a few times when she’d been a baby. Stopped breathing. Even had to ride in an ambulance one time. Another time, her aunt Linda did CPR. All in all, she was a really lucky child. Still alive.
Miranda had asthma, too. Dad smoked. A lot. What would you expect?
Dad didn’t live with them, but he always stayed over on Christmas Eve. Laura couldn’t remember when they were together, but that didn’t bother her. She never thought to ask the questions. Never really wanted to know. Things were fine the way they were. During the school year, she spent most weekends at his place in West Seattle. Other weekends, she’d go with Mom and her other siblings to Grandma’s and Grandpa’s in Bellevue. To the haunted house.
Laura had never seen a ghost herself, but she could still hope. The back rooms at Grandma’s were the most haunted. Sometimes, when she went back there by herself, she felt like someone was watching her, like there was someone there she couldn’t see. She hoped it was Shelly, the little girl ghost. But she never felt comfortable when she went back there alone, so it had to be the man in the black top hat. Or the crazy old woman searching for Shelly.
Laura shivered thinking about it. It would be great to see a ghost, but she wasn’t sure she could handle that. She usually went to Dad’s place anyway.
But at Grandma’s they always picked blackberries. Her and her cousins and siblings would go and pick blackberries. Aunt Rosie, Grandma, and Mom would take the gathered berries and turn them into a pie. There was always vanilla ice cream to go on top.
Grandpa would teach them how to catch bumblebees in large soda bottles, or ants in a jar. Laura didn’t think anyone loved Grandpa more than her and her cousin Nathan. He was the world to them. Once he’d taken them fishing. Nathan had been ecstatic, and Laura had thought it would be fun. Turns out, with fishing, it was mostly sitting around and waiting, something she wasn’t good at. She still liked to help him collect worms though. Lightening rods in the ground.
But there was the garden. Grandpa had a garden in the backyard. A very large backyard, mostly hill, with a plum tree right in the center. There were strawberries, cherry tomatoes, and a compost covered in flies. Laura thought the compost was interesting, and Grandpa said it made the best dirt. The compost was near the very old, run-down truck.
The truck spoke of magic to Laura. As far as she could remember, it had never worked. It sat there, rusting, and Laura couldn’t figure out why he kept it. He said it was because of the bag of gold stuck between the seats. She didn’t see any gold.
“Right there, far down. See that brown bag?” Grandpa pointed. “That bag is full of gold. Someday I’m going to figure out how to get it out of there, then we can be rich.”
Laura looked again, and this time there it was. Small brown bag, something Robin Hood would have attached to his belt. Awe filled her, and an excitement. They had a bag of gold coins, just out of reach. She swore she saw it shimmer.
“How do we get it?”
“I don’t know. Haven’t thought of that, yet,” Grandpa replied, adjusting the cowboy hat on his head. He was never without that hat. He may live in the city, but he hadn’t always.
“How did the gold get there?” Laura whispered, fearing the bag of gold would disappear if she talked too loudly.
“Trolls,” he told her, absolutely serious. “Trolls put that bag there for safe-keeping. They didn’t think I would be able to see it. Troll bags of coins are invisible to grown-ups, but that’s the joke on them. I never grew up.” And he laughed.
“They were trying to hide it from you by putting it in your truck?”
“Yeah. And if we ever find a way of getting it, we have to be very careful they don’t find out it was us who took it. Wouldn’t want a mad troll after us. They can be pretty fierce.”
“I’m not scared of trolls.” Laura paused, thinking for a moment. “Maybe, if we took a coat hanger, made it straight with a hook at the end, we can put it between the seats and grab that bag with it.”
“Good thinking. We’ll have to try that sometime.”
She couldn’t remember if they ever did try poking it with a clothes hanger, but that truck held magic for Laura. The old, blue truck with the bag of troll gold.
It was a house full of magic. Ghosts, troll gold, gardens, and the leprechauns that lived in a magic world in the walls. Carrie had the key, but we never found the keyhole.
Carrie had what looked to Laura like an old, antique key, something from a Victorian mansion. She said it belonged to the doorway into their special world, where leprechauns were nice, and no taller than Erin. She said when they finally found the right keyhole to that world, the leprechauns would celebrate their return by making a great feast of cakes and goodies and chocolate on a long table with a table cloth. They would stand there around the pretty dessert table in a green field, blue skies and rainbows behind them, maybe even flying horses in every color.
Carrie, Laura, Erin, and Diana went through the whole house, trying to fit the key into every dent and crevice in every wall, but never found where the key fit. Laura dreamed of the place many times, hoping they’d find a way in. The dreams were beautiful, but only dreams. It was years before she realized places like that just didn’t exist.

Morning dawned, bright and early, waking Laura...