Today i stood third in a very long line at the only supply store in my town (dollar general) after work, unable to check out and go home because two young men, likely teenagers or maybe 20 years old at most, were trying their luck at getting someone else to buy their snacks for them and i’m proud to say, nobody was biting on that fishing line. I see all this footage of protesters putting their arms in some kind of plaster or foam and mesh thing and letting it harden and then sitting in public waiting for the city to send someone to come cut them out because it would be pretty hard to go through life with your arms stuck in a big mesh and foam thing so of course someone else has to stop what they’re doing and rescue the person from what they’ve done to themselves in the name of a cause and i have to wonder if common sense is a thing that still exists these days. But as i stood in line i was proud of my town folk for standing their ground as i intended to. Not one of us, including the store clerk, would cover these two men’s bill. Theres reasons for that and i’ll get to them shortly but it was a win for good sense in a sea of losses these days, in my opinion. I am now part of the “older people” (strange thought) and its our job to teach the younger people how to move through the world. And we dont always do the greatest job of it. Theres a great number of hard working young people, but we’ve created a situation where those making $70,000 a year get taxed and penalized and charged $10,000 annually for health insurance and make too much money to qualify for any government assistance, credits, or exemptions. Those who make minimum wage qualify for all the exemptions, credits, food stamps, and $35 a month health insurance. It is a situation that sometimes spits out young people who think they are entitled to things simply because they breathe.
I found myself standing in line observing two sheepish young men, hunched with their legs splayed to look cool and keep their sagging pants from falling to their ankles, sporting guilty smiles and flickers of eye contact, as i had sometimes observed in the face of a sibling tattling on their brother after rules had been broken. their demeanor caught my attention and i wondered what they were so giggly about. I had been standing in line listening absent mindedly until i realized they were asking her to ring up and tell the price of each of a handful of items on the counter individually. I wondered if they just hadnt brought enough money to purchase the whole order and were trying to decide what to put back, but i was wrong. The cashier spoke up loudly in an annoyed voice, “You haven’t brought any money?” Both young men giggled again and nodded their heads no. The cashier said, “Come on now, just for these here it’s ten bucks. Surely between the two of you, you have ten bucks.” The young men grinned and giggled and nodded their heads no. One opened his empty wallet to show her there was nothing in it. The other showed his pockets. I wasnt raised as a delicate thing so my mind always goes to worst case scenario. I considered the possibility of a robbery or a shop lifting incident. One has to consider these things when men come into a store with zero cash in hand and stand at the check out counter giggling and grinning like its funny. I thought, “what is their end game here? What are these two about?” I shifted my keys to have my thumb on the button that slides my box cutter forwards and prepared for confrontation. The man in front of me had stepped aside and let me be next in line since i only held three items so i was directly behind the two young men that were holding up the line now. I didnt trust them with all their grinning and giggling. It was a strange way to behave for two people that brought no money to the store and i was just as unsettled by the fact that they were utterly unapologetic for holding things up and creating a line that wrapped around through the store while the only employee tried to make sense of them. The men kept asking her to ring up the items again one by one and tell them the individual price. She was frustrated with them because at this point she knew they didnt bring any money, so this exercise of price checking was futile when they had no way to purchase even one of the items. But they continued in their pointless endeavor. At this point the line was building notably and the cashier told them angrily that they needed to produce cash or swipe a card or she would take the items off the counter and they could leave the store. I knew the cashier. Its a small town. If i call and ask if something’s in stock before i leave work two towns away, they know who it is that’s asking just by the sound of my voice. All 3 employees that work there regularly are good people and i’d defend any one of them in a fight so i was ready now. The man behind me put his items down on the counter and i gathered he too was ready if things went south. Just about every human in the store probably had a knife or a gun on them. This is the country. You need them to shoot wild hogs, rattlesnakes, cut twine or packaging…. Because the cashier was getting agitated, we were now paying attention and waiting to see what was about to happen and if we needed to be a part of it. The man that had given me his spot in line stepped back in between myself and the two young men, void of his groceries. He was positioning for a show down. And then in the span of about five minutes all of the tension evaporated as we realized that these two had no plan other than to wait for the universe to deliver stuff to them. They werent there to commit a robbery or shop lift or get in a brawl. They were simply young people that had gotten the idea that the world owed them something because they existed and so therefore they should have. They had loaded the hand held cart up with takis, pringles, soda, gum, and cheetos. They had multiple types of snacks and two different kinds of soda. None of it was substantial food. It was all just junk, as the cashier later pointed out. These kids werent hungry. Ive been hungry. When you’re hungry you go buy a bag of rice because thats gonna go a long way for your dollar and put something in your stomach. You can season up the rice and it’ll feel nice on an empty belly. Starving people dont buy takis, soda, and gum. Stupid people buy takis, soda, and gum with zero dollars. For whatever reason, these two men who brought zero dollars with them started an argument that they thought would gain traction that the can of pringles should be one dollar. The cashier put her hand down on the counter and said, “no, baby, this is not a dollar. Theres no store in this world at this point where that can of pringles is a dollar. I dont know why you think that should be a dollar. Who told you the pringles were a dollar? Show me the sign where it says $1.” A packet of tuna is now $5. We all knew full well, whatever the pringles cost it wasnt $1, but it didnt matter and the argument was pointless considering the sum total the two young men had between them was $0. At this point the cashier tells them to get out of the store so she can check the other customers out. They take out their smart phones and begin calling someone. I cant understand what they’re saying as i am not fluent in the language they are speaking but from what i do know i gather that they are first talking to one of them’s father and then two more people afterwards and they are shopping around for humans with pulses and wheels to come down to the dollar general and buy their snacks for them. I’m leaving an important part of the visual out here. Not only do these two have smart phones. They have sunglasses and one of them is dripping with heavily layered silver chains around his neck. If you have money for ear piercings, chains, and sun glasses, starving you are not. My thought was that they could sell some of the bling if they wanted to purchase food and hadnt the funds to do it but i suspected if they were buying things like sun glasses, they were just trying to get someone to pay for them because they could, not because they needed it. Theres a difference between someone in need and someone in want. I can usually spot the difference with regular common sense. Someone in need does not spend on frivolous things before food, they buy bulk items that will go further, and they may be short on the amount needed to cover an order but they dont show up with zero money to begin with. I would be so ashamed to be covered in that much bling with my pants falling off my ass, grinning like a drunk ape and seeing if somebody would just give me stuff for free because i wanted it. Ive covered many a bill that was two to five dollars short just because the person didnt have it and you could see in their face that they needed the items, but i wasnt covering the order for these fools today and nobody else was either. We were not amused. We had all worked all day for the money in our pockets and these two clearly hadnt learned any sense of pride or what it meant to work for what you have. Somewhere along the way their parents had failed them but we would not fail them now. They were going to have to learn: if you want to eat, you work. They looked around the room in anticipation but not one of us spoke or moved from where we stood in line. We all stared at them, unwaveringly. They were waiting for one of us to get fed up with standing in line and in an effort to get things moving again say, “oh step aside i’ll cover it, here.” Nobody did. We stood patiently in silence, staring at them as the line grew. If “for shame” was a vibe the whole store was full of it. The cashier became fed up and began clearing the items from the counter. The taller of the two boys clawed desperately at the items saying, “wait wait wait wait….” In spanish he had an argument with the shorter man about whether the pringles were absolutely necessary or could he live without them. The shorter man shook his head and wore a very serious expression as he claimed the pringles were absolutely necessary. The taller man called his father again and asked him to load money onto his smart phone so he could pay for the snacks. To my surprise, the father agreed. He then told the cashier that he could pay now. She bagged the scanned items and handed the bag to the shorter of the two guys. He then stood there, not scanning his phone. The cashier was upset now as it looked like they might dash after all and raised her voice, “i gave you the items dude now either enter a card or scan the d*mn phone.” They made some half assed attempts at pointing the phone towards the card reader like a magic wand or swishing it around like a light saber. Finally the taller man stopped and just scanned his phone like normal and a receipt printed. She handed it to the man and both of them exited the store with their snacks in tow. She shook her head as she quickly rang the rest of us up one by one, “Geez, those two guys come in here with no money and its not like they’re starving, its all junk. Nothing but junk and snacks in their basket.” I was proud that we had all collectively decided the lesson being taken away from the situation was more important than getting the line moving. Teach young people that a stunt like that works and they’ll try it again. Why fix something if it isnt broken? If they can get hard working strangers to buy their snacks just cuz they want them and they think they should have whatever they want, they’ll never work a day in their lives. Why should they? Now, to the father who transferred money in the end so they could buy the snacks…you missed an opportunity. If they hadnt been able to procure the snacks, the chains, the sunglasses, the truck outside, or the smart phones…they might have had a reason to go to work. As long as you do for them, they’ll never have a reason to do for themselves. Let them struggle. Let them be hungry. Let them see what life without income is…they will get a job and do for themselves. We need adults who contribute to this community, not live off it like a parasite. Coming up short is something we’ve all done at one point or another in life and those around will pick you up and set you back on your feet but showing up to the dollar general with zero money in hand or pocket and expecting to leave with a basket full of snacks and soda…boggles the mind. They have no shame.