True Porn Clerk Stories - Ali Davis [37]
I like it. We're not penalizing the jerks so much as rewarding the good, and it's comforting to know that life sometimes works that way, even if it's on a small scale. And of course, many small scales I don't know about may be adding up all over town.
We help people out as often as we doom them. A simple "Good guy" or "She's really nice" can invisibly smooth a customer's rental paths for months to come, even if it just means a succession of especially friendly clerks.
I wonder if our customers ever think about the fact that the hand that helps balance out the scales of the universe may have just landed in a wad of their semen.
Out of Context
My friend Joe used to be a counselor. He wasn't a psychiatrist, but the counseling was of that nature -- sometimes pretty heavy stuff. One of the rules was that if he saw one of the people he was working with out on the street, he wasn't allowed to show recognition unless they greeted him first. It was a small city and being greeted by the counselor could mean that suddenly everybody knew you had problems.
I sometimes feel like that. Our store is very much a neighborhood store, and I see my regulars out all the time. I try not to recognize them until they acknowledge me. I used to automatically smile and say hi and most people were fine with that, but it did make a few people uncomfortable.
I saw two regulars out of the store last week. Monday was the most startling: I was heading to my theater for a show and suddenly Mr. Buddy leaned out the window of the restaurant next door. It took everything I had to keep from doing a take. I said hi and hotfooted it on my way without telling him where I was going. Mr. Buddy is harmless, but for some reason the thought of him seeing my show weirded me out to no end.
Over the weekend I ran into Mr. Dreadlocks. We'd come to the same peace march. I hadn't seen Mr. Dreadlocks in months -- he finally did something weird or upsetting enough that the general manager cancelled his account. (I don't know what, and I feel like if I hit the point where I care enough to ask I've crossed an important line.) I didn't end up talking to Mr. Dreadlocks. We'd always gotten along just fine, but in this case I didn't know what to say. I didn't know why he'd had his account cancelled or under what circumstances he was asked not to come back; a cheerful howyadoin might not have been appropriate.
It's hard not to wonder. Sure, he was creepy, but we have plenty of creepy people in the store. If creepy got you cancelled, we'd be out of business. I'm guessing by the way he fetishized the tapes it was either a lube or tampering issue.
On the other hand, he was really, really into charging small amounts on his American Express card. Three or more $3.69 rentals a day, charged separately an hour or two apart from each other. This was a pain in the ass for the store -- credit card transactions under $10.00 can actually lose us money -- and we couldn't figure out if it was just a side effect of the fetish or if he was trying to work some angle or what.
At any rate, Mr. Dreadlocks, already a little bit crazy and a little bit sleazy, did something crazy or sleazy or maybe just irritating enough that he can't rent our movies anymore.
He was ahead of me in the march, so I couldn't read the sign he was carrying for a while. My group was a little faster paced than his, and during the course of the march we passed him. I couldn't resist -- I had to glance over my shoulder and see his sign.
It was yellow and plastic, with blue cursive writing. It was a sign advertising another, completely different event. For the summer of 2000.
I think I'm going to miss him.
No More Ms. Nice Gal.
Arrrrggghhh.
I was having a lovely morning, right up until the end. Tuesday openers are very slow and I've grown to like them. I get my checklist of clerkly tasks done early and then, except for a very occasional customer, the morning is pretty much mine. It's not a bad way to ease into the day.
Today was going just swell.