2
SEP 2013
Published Sat Sep 14, 2013 2:00pm PST
Swiss Miss.
I'm at Walmart again. Just getting a few necessaries: bleach, dryer sheets, paper towels.
There's a woman talking loudly on her cell phone. She's talking about her invasive surgery. I'm genuinely happy to hear about the journey to this person's insides. That's not hyperbole. I'm not misusing the word genuinely. I was literally glad to know this woman was cut into. Why? Because this Walmart trip has been uneventful so far, and if this is the strangest thing that's going to happen to me, thank Jesus!
Swiss Miss.
Off to checkout. I find the shortest line: the one with three people. Two people immediately rush in behind me faster than a Secret Service detail. The lady in front of me kindly moves her cart aside so that I can put my things on the conveyor belt. I do that with glee because she's nice, Walmart's being sorta nice, and that means today is one of those great days Ice Cube was always going on about.
Swiss Miss.
I place the divider behind my items so the guy behind me can set his things down. You know, pay it forward. Or backward, to be directionally accurate. Anyway, the divider is down. The guy behind me is able to add to the conveyor. But before he can, a man in a dirty shirt swoops in and plunks down four boxes of Swiss Miss.
Dirty shirt.
Swiss Miss.
Four of 'em.
I immediately realize the prankster gods of Walmart just returned from lunch. I refuse to make eye contact with the man. But I gotta know what the people behind him are thinking. I gotta see the faces of the folks he just brazenly cut in line. So I look.
Oddly enough, they are nowhere near the level of blazing fury I expected. No sleeves being rolled up by clenched fists. No earrings being snatched off and safely stored for ass whooping. No knees targeted for the man's groin. I assume this is because they are all familiar with the psychic nipple twist that is the Walmart shopping experience. But no. It was because they knew what I only suspected at the time.
I catch a glimpse of the man. Let's call him Dirty Shirt, because it's a very dirty shirt. If you put this shirt under a pile of garbage, it would get cleaner. That's how dirty this shirt is. So Dirty Shirt seems completely oblivious to the fact that he cut in front of what is now five people in line. He's just excited about purchasing his Swiss Miss.
His four boxes of Swiss Miss.
And nothing else.
Just Swiss Miss.
Four boxes.
If everybody's happy, I'm ecstatic. I just want to get out of here before this gets turned up a notch. I pay for my things, load them into my cart, and I'm off and on my way, never having to worry again that my Izod might catch shirt syphilis.
Except Dirty Shirt follows right behind me. Follows me all the way to the exit, close enough behind me to make me wonder if this is the day I die or kill someone. When we exit, Dirty Shirt walks on past me, off to who knows where. No murder-deaths today. But I notice he doesn't have the Swiss Miss. And that's when my suspicions are confirmed.
Who plans to buy four boxes of Swiss Miss and walks away with none? Someone who forgot his wallet? No. Someone who suddenly made the connection between his dairy intake and his unceasing sputter-poots? Nope. Someone who is mentally stunted and socially unsupervised? That's the one.
Dirty Shirt wasn't stalking me. And he wasn't some Donald Trump-ish douchebag who was in a hurry and felt his time was more valuable than all the other Walmart shoppers.
Dirty Shirt was, for lack of a better word, playing. He was playing shopping, something he sees people do, but never gets to do himself. In his mind, people pick up boxes of stuff, they get in a line, they put it on a table that drives, they wink to the person at the register, and shopping done. *brushes hands*
Side Note: I'm realizing now that I could have named him Swiss Miss instead of Dirty Shirt. That would have been kinder. But in my defense, it was a really really dirty shirt. It was like a less ugly Christian Audigier shirt.
I'll never forget Dusty Shorts--I mean, Dirty Shirt. Every time I've gone back to Walmart since, I purchase a box of Swiss Miss in his honor.
...
Naw, I don't. That would be crazy. I don't know the guy. He could be a murderer. He could also be the furthest thing from a murderer, but that's my point: I don't know him. And I don't even like hot chocolate.
And if I did know him, I'd want to unknow him. Because nothing good can come from befriending someone I met in one of my
~That Swiss Miss Dissin' Mofo~