The first email I read at work this morning went like this:
“Dear Bud,
You are a remarkable person. I don’t know how you do all that you do, with such style and such panache. You are a pillar of strength to all who find themselves fortunate enough to work with you. Without you, this entire organization would be lost, frightened, and, on the whole, much less attractive. Your proud, firm buttocks inspire me. Oh, and I like your new haircut, too.
By the way, remember that officer Cletus hasn’t turned in his July 7th leave slip, and you have to fax the printers the Form 6. Update the phone list and ask Rhoda where the fax numbers for Yuma are.”
I receive emails like this all the time...from myself. I send myself one at the end of every day to remind myself of the things I didn’t get done the day before, usually because I’ve wasted time writing flattering emails to myself.
I get emails from other people, too, of course, though these tend to be somewhat drier affairs. “I need this” and “Send me that” and “Call so-and-so.” Nobody ever mentions my new haircut, my firm buttocks, or the new plastic cactus cake decorations I’ve just glued to my monitor. Sometimes I wonder why I bother. It seems like every time I go to the office, all I do is work.
Today, though, I received a real email from one officer Barrel Cactus (note: NOT his real name). It read: “Bud, can you print these pictures out and put them in with the rest of the file? Thanks.” Attached to the message were six photo icons. While slurping noisily from my one gallon iced tea mug (it really annoys the girls across the way...tremendous fun) I clicked on an icon and spun my chair around to make sure my printer was on. I love my spinny chair. I have a chair that spins at home, but there’s no room to really build any momentum. So, slurping and spinning, I waited for my printer to stop doing whatever it does to make all its lights blink and gears grind, a process that takes several minutes and ends with a long, loud beep.
I was slightly dizzy when I turned back to the monitor, where the full screen image of dozens of mutilated pigs piled atop one another, their bodies torn open and their guts spilling out, caught me completely off guard. Iced tea erupted indelicately from my nose as I sputtered and clawed for the mouse, trying to send this image back to hell where it belonged. I’m sure I would have cried out, “Jesus Christ!” but my mouth was full of iced tea and I was suddenly unable to swallow. There was so much blood! I abandoned the mouse and instead seized the trash can, and spat the iced tea into it.
Then I sat quite still, listening, wondering if anyone had heard any of that. It appeared no one had.
I turned back to the monitor to deal with the carnage. So many dead pigs. It was utterly depressing. Curly piggy tails and piggy snouts, all tainted with death and gore. Picture after picture. Closeups. Wide angle shots. Headless pigs and pig heads lying open-mouthed in the dirt. Black, swollen tongues, dead, dusty eyes, and cloven hooves pointing up at the sky. Pictures of the pigs loaded onto a flatbed truck. Pictures of the truck dumping the pigs into a ditch.
I’m used to receiving photos via email. They’re evidence. Usually, though, the pictures are of live horses and cows, or of substandard housing or empty water toughs. Occasionally, I’ll get a picture of a pen lying in the dirt to give a size scale to a foot print or tire track that didn’t come out in the photo. Yes, there is a dead animal here or there, but these are usually animals that have simply toppled over and never gotten up.
My disgust quickly grew into resentment. Who sends people pictures of dead animals, especially disemboweled dead animals, without giving a bit of a heads up first? A little disclaimer, like maybe, “By the way, these pictures are gross,” is most certainly in order. I’m sure Miss Manners would back me up on this.
After that debacle, I needed a cigarette. The problem was I had no cigarettes. And so, shortly thereafter, I found myself walking to the convenience store across the street from where I work. As I crossed the street, a woman approached me and asked, “Hey, do you have any crack?”
“Excuse me?” I said. I was sure I’d misheard her. People simply don’t walk up to other people in broad daylight and ask them for crack. It’s just not done in civilized society. Surely she was asking me for the time. Or perhaps some spare change. I slowed my pace and turned to look at her. She stood swaying in heavy black boots, and wore a tattered flannel shirt unbuttoned to her navel, revealing a soiled brassiere and peeling, sunburned skin. One side of her hair was braided; the other was caked in filth.
“Do you have any crack?” she asked again.
“No, I don’t have any crack,” I said. “Sorry.”
One of the many pitfalls of having worked a good long while in retail is that I tend to be overly polite and apologetic to strangers, including, apparently, junkie crackwhores. Regaining a bit of composure, I put on a disapproving face and continued on my way. After a moment, I was aware of someone following closely behind me, just out of my line of sight. I slowed my pace to let who ever it was pass me, but instead an older African American man fell into step with me and began chatting.
“She just askin’ you for crack?”
“I guess.”
“God DAMN! That shit right there is crazy!”
I smiled politely and quickened my pace. The man beside me kept on talking as if we’d been friends for years. I missed most of what he was saying, but I did notice that what few teeth he had left were as yellow as corn kernels, and just as small. After that, I kept my eyes focused on the convenience store just up ahead. So close!
“Oh hey, man,” the guy said. “You got a dollar?”
“Sorry,” I said. “I don’t carry cash.”
“Oh, ok. That’s cool.”
We parted ways as I entered the convenience store, and took my position tenth in line behind haggard men and women buying lottery tickets and single 45 ounce cans of beer with fistfuls of change. While I waited, the man who had been talking to me entered the store. All of us in line watched as he openly stuffed his pockets with Cheeto’s and Aunt Freshly’s iced honey buns. The young Latina cashier was preoccupied with attempting to pick change up off the counter with her four inch long plastic fingernails, which were orange and glittered.
He was still there when my time at the counter came, his pockets absurdly stuffed and rustling and he waved a dollar bill over my shoulder at the cashier and asked for change.
“I have to make a sale first to open the register,” she said. I asked for a pack of cigarettes, and handed the girl a five dollar bill.
“I though you said you didn’t have no cash,” said the guy behind me.
“I thought you said you didn’t have any money,” I said.
“Motherfucker,” he said.
“Oh, fuck you,” I said.
I thought he might follow me out of the store, but he didn’t. When I last saw him, he was trying to make room in his pockets for the change the cashier had given him and swearing to himself.
I crossed the street and attempted to enjoy a cigarette while sitting on a bench outside in 115 degree weather. I was sweating profusely from the walk and I wanted my iced tea. I put the cigarette out and went to the key card lock by the door to the building. I keep my badge clipped to my front pocket, which is level with the key card slot. I can usually run it through the lock without unclipping it, which is what I was attempting to do when my boss suddenly came out through the door. My apparent intimacy with the lock confused her, and she asked, “What are you doing?”
"Oh, hey," I said, startled. I slipped past her into the building. “Just getting back to work,” I said.
Posted by johnfrommelt
at 9:16 PM
Updated: Monday, 18 July 2005 9:35 PM
