Grandmama smoked cigarettes, the smoke swirling as the red-wing black birds she watched fluttered like ruby UFOs in the big yard of summer green, the glass orb on its pedestal surrounded by flowers and a garden of carrots and cabbage and long green beans … the rabbit war machines with glossy eyes looking upward at great big orange BOG riding the heat wave on his surfboard from another planet …
“Are there drugs in here?” the mirror asked me as I played Poseidon in the bathroom and my great trident nothing more than a broomstick painted red … red like blood, red like red-winged blackbirds, red like the lips on the gal at the corner grocery smacking pink gum like a sorceress from some pillow castle. I saw her there when the old woman needed more cigarettes and Sanka. She smiled at me. I stared back, dumbfounded. She laughed and then turned away. She sort of smelled like a pine tree.
And that’s where they found me … on the floor in the bathroom at Grandmama’s house, a red broom on the floor beside me, red eyes and red blood coming out of my mouth. They wanted to know if I tried to kill myself. They didn’t understand I just had a seizure and bit my tongue. Did they want me to kill myself? Would that have made them happy?
They wanted me to leave, but I wanted to stay. I yelled something like: “Just leave me the hell alone!” My mother was shocked. My father was disappointed. And then I ran out the back door and into the splash of heat and sun and moist air and I darted across the lawn and a voice called out from the house behind me … “Where are you going?”
I didn’t know. I never knew. I was aimless. Still aimless. And aimlessly I wandered along the babbling brook down in the forest behind Grandmama’s house. It was quiet, peaceful. I was doing nothing wrong yet I got scolded for running away like I did. Punished for just wanting to be free … free, free, free. Life is chains they put on you. Life is a cage they lock you in. Life is always having to do something you really don’t want to do. Life is always being somewhere you don’t want to be. We are dragged relentlessly from our peaceful places, our peaceful thoughts, our peaceful hearts and thrust into a world that knows nothing of peace.
I just wanted to sit on a rock and listen to the water and feel the sun but I was dragged out of there by my Grandmama and she scolded me for behaving so poorly. That’s what she said: “So poorly.”
I was made to sit in a chair in the corner of the kitchen. I wasn’t allowed to speak. I wasn’t spoken to. All I heard was my Grandmama’s slippers shuffling along the linoleum floor as she boiled water, dragged down a cup and jar of Sanka. I could hear the spoon being tapped on the lip of her cup as she put in the coffee. I could hear the water being poured in and then the spoon again as she stirred it, the scraping of the metal against the ceramic. I could hear her breath as she blew at the hot coffee. I could hear it go down her throat as she swallowed. I could hear the tobacco burn as she took another drag off her cigarette. She eyed me suspiciously, but said nothing. I could hear her cigarette being tapped against the green glass ashtray as she knocked off the precarious ash. I could hear her cough.
The next morning, I went outside and rode my bike up and down the street in search of the lady from the grocery store. I rang the bell on my bike in hopes it would grab her attention. I rode and rode and rode, like a mad child, ringing that damn bell in search for love and grace. The houses remained still. Not a single door or window opened. I was left alone on earth, brokenhearted, a boy who acts poorly, punished, exiled, made scandalous. I finally gave up at high noon and just went to sit in the grass on the side of the road somewhere. A car came barreling down the street and when it got near to me the driver leaned on the horn and yelled out the window: “Get out of the street!” But I wasn’t really in the street. My feet were sort of in the street. Why was everyone on my ass for merely existing?
And here I am – 40 plus years later and wondering the very same thing. By now the madness has become exponential. The killing, the hurting, the shooting, the ugliness of spirit. The rudeness, the criticism, the lack of empathy. The hatred, the bigotry, the heartless and gutless approach to debate. The death of human decency.
But no more.
I’m at the launchpad. I’m wearing my spacesuit. I made the cut and now I am going away, with others, to another planet. Goodbye earthlings. Don’t call. Don’t write. Don’t try to follow us into space. We’re tired of this. We’re done. You’ll never learn how to simply be kind to one another.
It was at a Red Lobster restaurant on the outskirts of Peoria, Illinois when the nervousness really kicked in.
I was sipping on a cranberry Boston iced tea and thinking about the loneliness of the sea at the same time I was looking out the window at the savage ravages of the world. The thought of going back out into that chaotic traffic made me upset.
I looked across at the woman sitting there with me. She was intensely studying the menu.
“What are you thinking you’d like to eat?” I asked her.
“A salad, maybe.”
“A salad? That’s gay.”
She looked up at me, disgusted almost. “What?”
“This is Red Lobster. Enjoy the delicious bounty of the sea, for Christ’s sake.”
“What’s wrong with you?”
“Nothing.”
“You seem on edge.”
“You always say that.”
“Because you always seem on edge.”
“I have a nervous condition… You know this. And you ordering a salad at Red Lobster doesn’t help any. At least get some little baby shrimp on your salad. Geez.”
She leaned in closer across the table. “I can eat whatever I want, thank you very much.”
“Oh, right. News flash. I’m the man. You should eat what I suggest.”
She scoffed. “News flash. I’m not living like that. You can stick your antiquated ways of thinking right up your keester!”
“Keep your voice down, woman. Don’t you dare embarrass me at Red Lobster!”
“I’m going to use the restroom. Perhaps consider readjusting your attitude while I’m gone. And I swear, if I come back and you’ve eaten all the cheddar biscuits, I’m going to scream.”
She got up and I watched her shapely ass as she walked away toward the bathrooms. I suddenly thought about ditching her. Yeah, that would be a story to tell the grandkids. About how I ditched some chick at a Red Lobster in Peoria, Illinois.
I got up and walked outside to smoke a sailor cigarette and think about things. The roar of the traffic and the hot sun were annoying.
I went to the car, unlocked it, and got in. I started it up and backed out of the space and drove off.
I went along aimlessly until I found a cheap chain motel. I checked in and went to my room. It smelled like sex and cigarettes. The view from the window was poison and the color of love gone astray. I drew the heavy curtains, and the room became depressingly dark. I turned the A/C up to high. It was rattly and noisy. I went to the bed and laid down on it without drawing the blankets back. I started screaming at the ceiling and I just kept on screaming until some very strange people came into the room, lifted me up, and took me away to a far better place.
She was eating a banana in the produce section. I noticed because I’ve really been into the color yellow lately. I suppose you could say it’s my favorite color now. It was green for a long time due to my inebriation for nature. Then it was blue because I like lakes and water and the sky at times. But now it’s yellow. I want everything to be yellow … maybe it has something to do with the passing of time and the yellowing of memories, paper, photographs, peeling hallways, old wedding dresses, ghost faces in sun-dappled windows. Perhaps I’m preparing to become a ghost. For some reason I can see myself right now in military fatigues, dusty, war-torn, and I’m standing at a third-story window of a big old house that sits on a cliff overlooking the wild sea. It’s quiet and lonely and maybe I’m dead. Does that even matter to time at all? If I had existed or not? To anyone or any moments I may have affected? The world would have barely noticed. And now I can hear the war far off as I stand and look out through the dusty glass and I’m smoking a soldier cigarette, and the ash is long and precarious. Then there comes a knock from downstairs. Someone’s pounding on the door. I decide it won’t matter if I answer, and it won’t matter if whoever is knocking comes busting in. I’m here, but I’m gone. The yellow world out there is my maze and amazement.
There are broken bones on the floor of the pharmacy.
Some poor soul with a banana phone steps over intricate bloodlines as he shops for a birthday card for his long-lost niece.
He has somehow forgotten she has died.
That she fell off a cliff on the coast of Wales.
Now she’s a swimming ghost in Cardigan Bay.
“Customer assistance needed in the photo department, the photo department, the photo department…”
That robotic shrill from above annoys him to the point of gnawing his own hands off at the wrists.
“I heard she fell off a cliff,” a stranger breathes into his face. “Or did you push her?”
“I’ve never even been to Wales,” the man pleads. He runs.
A wailing kid in a shoe store gets punched by his Mum.
People are shocked and horrified.
But if he had been gunned down at school… Eh, no big deal. Bullets are bigger than a child’s blood.
The man with the banana phone tries on some Keds as the boy continues to whine and writhe.
“Shut up!” the Mum screams.
People stare. People shake their heads in disbelief.
But if he had been starving on the other side of a war-torn world, they would have stepped over his visible rib cage on the way to the souvenir shop.
The man thinks the Keds suck. Too tight. Not enough cushion and support. American-made crap.
“Excuse me… Do you have any Asian-made shoes?”
The dumbfounded clerk scoffs. “Look around, dude.”
“Ah… And could you possibly do something about that screaming child and his abusive mother? It’s all making for a very uncomfortable shopping experience.”
“Dude… They don’t pay me enough. Not enough to live or eat or buy gas. I don’t even know why I’m here except for the fact my dad is a jerk.”
“Did he come from the jerk store?” The man with the banana phone laughs out loud.
“What?”
“You’re too young. Thanks for your time, though. But I think I’ll just buy some shoes online.”
It’s sunny and warm outside and the man with the banana phone stops at a hot dog stand and orders one steaming wiener on a bun with ketchup only. He raises the dog to the proprietor as in a wedding toast and smiles. “Good stuff. But say, being that you’re in the business, could you tell me what the difference is between ketchup and catsup?”
“There’s no difference at all,” the wiener dealer growls. “You’re referring to regional variations in spelling. Same damn thing.”
“Ah ha… Well, either way. Thanks for the delicious wiener. I’ll be sure to come around again when I’m in the neighborhood.”
“Can’t wait.”
In celebration of the hot dog vendor’s words, the man goes home and repeatedly plays the song “I Can’t Wait” by Stevie Nicks as he stands in front of the window like a mannequin and looks down upon the street. The world is a hustling and bustling place, he thinks. “Look at all those devils and saints sucking in air out there.” He sighs. “If only I could fly. I would leave this place and find unmuddied peace. But I suppose I’ll have to wait until I die.” He sits down at the small table there and begins to shuffle his favorite deck of playing cards. It’s time for Solitaire. In solitude. Away from the chaos of worldly interaction. The streetlights come on. The window is open, and the summer air smells like candy and gunpowder.
On the green and misty outskirts of Cincinnati, a man named Saul Revenge pauses in his driveway and looks at his blue house. His rust-orange suit is crumpled from a day of working and living. Everything seems intact beneath a cantaloupe and baby-blue cotton colored sky streaked with bruise gray. The shrubs are neatly pruned and still, the grass is evenly mowed, the rose bushes are giving birth to their first blossoms of the season. Rose buds, he thinks. How very sexual. He plucks one and glides it against his face. He puts it in his mouth and gently sucks as he would on her if he could. Vivian, his life partner, is an arctic volcano.
He spits and turns his attention back to the house. His house. His refuge. His burden. The front windows, tall and narrow, are the color of deep-blue aluminum glass. Yet, there is something beyond the static and ironed curtains that seems unsettled and almost twisted. He shifts as he looks, readjusts the brown paper bag he’s cradling. He’s a weird man and so looks at the paper sack and smiles, but just for a moment. Those small slivers of joy in his life dissipate so quickly now.
Saul Revenge knows there will be that certain smell when he presses on and goes through the front door with its gentle click on the close. It will be the smell of carpet dust dancing in the day’s final sun rays. It will be the lingering warm mechanical scent of a vacuum motor mixed with his wife’s perfume. She’ll most likely be sitting on the end of the couch reading a book and drinking a cold combination of lemonade and orange juice and most likely Swedish vodka.
He imagines how she’ll look up at him and vaguely smile when he walks in, her fresh lipstick glistening, some imprinted upon the edge of her drinking glass. Her bare legs will be crossed at the knees. He’ll think about her in-between spot that lies beyond the skirt hem. But she’ll just set the book aside and say something meaningless like: “I’m making chicken pot pies for supper. I hope that’s okay.”
Moments later he finds himself interacting with her in a very realistic way. “Chicken pot pies?” Saul repeats in the entryway as he works his shoes off with his feet.
“What?” she wonders aloud.
“I thought you said something about chicken pot pies.”
His wife sets her book aside. “No, but I thought about it for supper. How did you know?”
Saul shoots her an aching grin. “I’m psychic, remember?” He laughs about it, but it’s not even funny.
She follows him into the kitchen where he puts the paper sack down on the table. “I got you more lemonade and the lens wipes you asked for,” he tells her, aching for her approval. He’s always aching for her approval.
She looks through the bag. “What about my fruit cups? Did you forget my fruit cups?”
“Now don’t get hysterical…”
“Hysterical? You know I need my fruit cups.”
Saul sighs with frustration. “Come on Vivian, we’ve talked about this before. Pre-packed fruit like that is a total scam, not to mention horrible for the environment with all that plastic they pack it in. I don’t understand why you can’t just peel your own fruit like a normal person.”
“Normal person? Oh, so now I’m a freak because I enjoy the convenience of fruit cups?”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“Oh, I’m quite sure it’s what you meant.”
“Vivian, please. I’ve had a long day.”
“Oh, yes. Excuse me. Another riveting day in the life of a bread salesman.”
“Are you discounting what I do? Because I happen to perform a very important role in the American food chain. I bring bread to people’s lives.”
Vivian snorts and tries to walk away. Saul grabs her by the arm and turns her to face him.
“Don’t mock me, Vivian. Do you even realize how important bread is to society. It’s a staple commodity, Vivian. It’s important, which in turn makes me important.”
She pulls away from him. “You’re crazy,” she snaps.
“Crazy, huh? Well, you certainly seem to enjoy the lifestyle my so-called riveting career affords you. You certainly don’t seem to mind sitting around this nice house all day doing nothing while I’m out there selling and merchandising bread 60 hours a week.”
“You think I do nothing?”
“Oh, that’s right. My apologies. I left out sitting on your ass, drinking booze and playing with your love box… I’d love to see your lot in life if you didn’t have me in it. It would be hopeless and sad.”
Vivian’s open right palm moves quickly through the air and strikes his bristled, shadowy face.
The crack startles him. He quickly grabs her by the wrists and looks into her sparkling blue eyes that maddeningly swirl like space. He suddenly kisses her mouth.
She pulls away from his slobbering moan. “What are you doing!?”
“I love you, Vivian. I really do. Even when you hurt me.”
“I hurt you?” She wipes her mouth with her arm. She moves to retrieve a fresh glass and pours herself a stiff drink.
“Please don’t drink more, Vivian. I’m sorry about what I said, baby. I really am.”
She drains the glass and sets it down. “Don’t tell me what to do, or not to do, or anything… I’m going to take a shower before I make your supper… I hope that’s all right.”
Saul tries to embrace her, puts a hand between her legs. “I could help wash you.”
She forcibly rejects him and slips away toward the other side of the house before Saul can say anything else.
***
It’s dark time and he lays awake in bed and stares at the ceiling the color of ghost skin. Vivian is dead asleep beside him, the heavy round of magic sleepers now fully kicking in. Saul leans up on an elbow and tries to look at her. She resembles an under ripened schoolteacher. He suddenly envisions her ringing a great golden school bell in the recess yard. Her blonde hair is tightly pulled back into a ponytail. She’s wearing a cream-colored winter sweater, a red scarf around her neck, her breath is visible because it’s so cold out. For some strange reason she is crying out “Ho! Ho! Ho!”
The bedroom is mostly dark except for the glow of the stereo’s dials and lenses along with the purple blue hue emanating from the miniature moon nightlight perched upon one of the night tables. He looks toward the windows and light pollution lurching up from the bulge of the city leaks in through curtain slits. Saul lies back down and closes his eyes. He can hear Vivian breathing. He wonders if she worries about things as much as he does. He decides she probably doesn’t. Who could possibly worry more than him? He sighs deeply. He tries to form a dream scenario in his head. Where will he go and what will he do, he wonders. How does the mind create such foreign places? Places he has never been to before. But they must exist. Somewhere. In some time, near or far, forward, or back. How otherwise could he paint them?
If dreams were to truly come true, there would be chaos.
A dark rage within slept sounder than he did. But then there was softness, too, like butterscotch or yellow flowers or a deep blue sky with little to no need for a bandage.
Vivian stirred as his mind flew around like a Tilt-A-Whirl surfacing from the annals of lost Americana. Her eyes were sealed shut, but her mouth was propped open by some invisible force. She was beautiful, he knew that. Saul also knew that perhaps someday that beauty would be used against him. She would torture him before a judge and jury, and he would be hung before a crowd in the plaza of light. Everyone would cheer. Jesus would lead him away in shackles.
Paranoia. Restless breathlessness. He feels the struggling heart in his chest begin to quicken. Dark stripes on the wall begin to materialize into something… Someone.
He moves his body and is then sitting on the edge of the bed. His bare feet are touching the cold floor. There’s not a stitch of carpet in the entire house—a mid-century animalistic menagerie in the stylish old-world part of this Ohio town. Vivian coughs and it startles him. She rolls onto her side. There, something on the walls is whispering to him. A hiss of turbulent thoughts, history, orders, wishes. Saul is tired but awake at the same time. He gets dressed and walks out of the room.
He goes out into the backyard. Instead of stars there are billions upon billions of books. White spines lined up on the shelving of the jungle pitch heavenwards. The words are all alien hieroglyphics. Moonlight glistens. The glow of Cincinnati is a Buddha belly circus dome off in the distance. The air is mildly refrigerated.
Saul looks down and realizes his feet are still bare and in the moist grass. At the far end of his perfectly manicured and ornate Zen lawn and garden, he catches the glimpse of a figure near the wooden fence. There is a woman there in a green dress, the fringes of her entire mass aglow. She is not young or old. Her whitish hair flows without the aid of gravity. Her eyes are pure white, no pupils, no iris, no anything. Like small, disinfected hard-boiled Easter eggs peeled and ready to eat with salt. Salt from her own tears.
There is a telepathic nod, and he understands.
“I can make anything happen,” Saul replies. “There are no consequences for a man’s actions within his own dreams. Or if he is smart enough, within his own reality.”
The woman in the green dress slowly floats into a mist and disappears.
***
Bertram Chokewine is an uptight capitalistic hog. His tennis ball-shaped brain cage resembles a clean-cut frosted Arctic tundra. He wears silver -rimmed spectacles over his blue-ice eyes. The lenses are circular, studious, and ancient. His face is scraped clean, waxy, pure, artificial. He wears a clean shirt, expensive necktie, perfectly pressed trousers, plush underwear, fine socks, polished shoes. His cologne reeks like an upscale department store carved into the belly of a virgin ice cave.
He’s pecking at his computer keyboard when Saul Revenge comes knocking on the door.
Mr. Chokewine freezes for a moment. Tries to reassemble his whereabouts. “Yes? Come in.”
Saul enters the office. He’s timid and scatterbrained. He has no idea why he’s been summoned by the boss.
Bertram stands, smiles, extends a strong hand. He’s very fit for a man in his late 50s. Saul feels less a person for it. He fixates on the fact that he’s soft, often disheveled. He wonders if he’s been called in because his appearance isn’t professional enough. He’s not polished and slick or gleaming. He suddenly feels like old news.
“Everything all right for you this morning, Saul?… Please, have a seat.”
Mr. Chokewine gestures toward a box of fresh muffins on the desk. “Help yourself to a muffin. I have Claudette pick them up for me at that little bakery around the corner.” He pauses. Smirks like a twat. “Just between you and me, I’d like to eat her muffin, if you know what I mean.”
“Sir?”
“Oh, come on, Saul. Relax. We’re just two guys shooting the shit first thing in the morning before we do the meaningful things we do. You can’t tell me that you haven’t noticed Claudette is one fine piece of ass. And great knockers, too. Don’t you think?”
Saul shifts nervously in his seat. “Oh, well, sir. I don’t really have an opinion about that. I’m a married man. Remember Vivian? From the Christmas party?”
“Yes, yes. Vivian. Not a bad little number herself.” Mr. Chokewine chuckles as he removes the paper cup from the base of his banana chocolate chip muffin. But really, Saul? You’re married not buried.” He stares at the muffin as if it were an object of sexual desire. “Mmm. Men like tits, and all the other bits, period. And I will confess, one man to another. I look at Claudette’s tits. I like them. Hell, I’d like to slap them around a little bit. I’m not afraid to admit it. I’m a man who knows what he likes, Saul, and I don’t mind letting it be known.”
“Aren’t you afraid she might take offense,” Saul remarks as he leans forward and looks over the selection of fresh muffins. “She could get you fired.”
“Nonsense. Claudette is one of my most loyal servants… Employees is what I meant to say. But enough of that. We’re here to talk about you, Saul.”
“Is there a problem?”
“Yes. I’m afraid there is.”
“What is it?”
“The problem is you, Saul. Your productivity has been steadily slipping over the past few months. Your numbers are way down. What’s going on with you, truly?”
“I don’t understand. I work very hard. I’m very dedicated. You know how important bread is to me. Are you sure the numbers are right?”
Mr. Chokewine taps on his keyboard and reads over his computer screen. “The information is reliable, Saul. It’s AI after all. You are our lowest performing salesman… And you have been for quite a while.” He opens a desk drawer and retrieves a sheet of paper. He pushes it across the desk toward Saul.
“What is this?”
“It’s a reprimand.”
“A reprimand?”
“Yes. And unless I see some improvement in your productivity in the next 30 days. I will have no choice but to let you go.”
“What? You’re going to fire me?”
“Only if you fail to turn things around, Saul. I know you can do it. I have faith in you.”
Saul scans the paper in more detail. “It doesn’t seem like you have any faith in me. None, according to this.”
And it’s then that Saul begins to feel this flush of heat in his head, that old familiar feeling of anxiety, a melding of weakness and anger and disgust with the world and his own place in it. Hello old friend, he thinks. Hello to those painful reminders of how much he gives and gives and keeps on giving and in return receives blank stares and ungrateful dismissals. Hello to the old lump in the throat, then the disintegration of manliness and he is suddenly overcome with the reality of his own disastrous existence, and he falters and begins to cry. There he is, a grown man and supposedly professional cog in the machine, and he is weeping in front of his silver prick boss.
Bertram Chokewine watches him in a revelry of part disgust, part sympathy, part joy. He reaches a hand forward and pushes a button on his desk phone. He speaks to the invisible. “Claudette, would you bring us a box of facial tissues.”
A moment later she enters the room.
Mr. Chokewine points at a blubbering Saul Revenge. “Be a good girl and wipe away his tears.”
Claudette approaches him, snaps two tissues from the box and dabs at his eyes. “There, there,” she whispers in a nurturing tone. “There’s no need to cry.” Her heavy, intelligent breasts sweep across his face as she tends to him. She looks over her shoulder at Mr. Chokewine and smiles, and in a mocking way about Saul says, “Real men don’t cry.” She turns her gaze back to him, pushes her breasts further into him. Saul can smell her scent. That of woman skin and a dime-store perfumed spray.
“I can cry if I want,” Sauls says in his own defense. “There’s no shame in that.”
Mr. Chokewine gets up from his desk and positions himself directly behind Claudette, his crotch situated alarmingly close to her ass. “I suppose not, but then again, no woman is going to want to deal with a crybaby. Isn’t that right, Claudette?”
“If I wanted a crybaby, I’d be working at a daycare.” She laughs hysterically.
“It takes a real man to sell bread at the professional level,” Mr. Chokewine says, his pelvis slowly grinding against Claudette’s backside.
“Please, sir. I beg of you. I need this job. I’m planning a trip to the Farasan Islands. It’s supposed to be a surprise for my wife. For our anniversary.”
Bertram’s thrusting motions become more punctual. The pressure wave moves through Claudette’s body and emits a warm libido against him. Saul can taste her breath in the air as she gently pants like a summer dog so close to him.
“The Farasan Islands? Are you even allowed to go there?” Mr. Chokewine demands to know. “That sounds like a made-up story to me.”
“It’s not made up… Good lord, are you about to make love to her right in front of me!?”
“Would you enjoy that, Saul. Or would you just cry some more,” Mr. Chokewine snaps.
“This isn’t right! This whole horror show isn’t right!” Saul cries out.
“Zip it!” Mr. Chokewine says as he loosens his belt and lets his pants fall to the floor. “Why don’t you take yourself a long weekend and reflect on your poor work performance and how you can turn things around. Think about how you could better yourself, Saul, perhaps enough so that a woman like Claudette here might fall in love with you.”
“That’ll be the day,” she giggles and jiggles. “I like my men with big balls and a penchant for superior work performance coupled with high wages… Oh, Mr. Chokewine! You’re poking me with your thick stick!”
“That’s right, Claudette. And as soon as Weepy Willy here leaves us be, I’m going to thank you for those delicious muffins in a proper way… Go on now, Saul. Get out of here. But I expect to see you first thing Monday morning with a fresh new plan for your tentative future here.” He waves him off as if he were a disposable soul. “Bye, bye.”
“Ciao, baby,” Claudette adds. And then she grunts like a soft animal.
Author’s Note: I have an ongoing personal battle with my local Walgreens store, and it’s recently boiled over into a volcano of emotions and so I have penned a letter to spill the lava within me and help release some of my feelings and this is what I present here:
From: Valued Customer #399745RG43
Dear Walgreens Management Team:
CC: Corporate Office, A Higher Power
Let me get right to it and say your Pharmacy Department is abysmal, and if you don’t know what abysmal means, it means pretty darn awful.
There isn’t a single time that I go to pick up a prescription that the drive-thru line is not backed up to the street or the line inside isn’t all the way back to the door to the restrooms. Why do I and others have to divest so much of our personal time just to get the medicine we need?
I’ll tell you. Corporate greed. You all make billions and billions of dollars a year and you can’t hire one or two more people to work the counter? (But continue to raise prices).
And another reason? Your pharmacy staff is untrained and unqualified. Do you only hire GED flunkies and Taco Bell rejects? Now, I know that was being a bit harsh, but I’m just being honest.
However, in fairness, I will have to say you do have some competent people there. It’s just a shame they are so overworked and overburdened. (And surely underpaid). And why do you have them call me every day to ask about a refill or how I’m doing on a new med? You can tell by their tone of voice they hate doing this. Their exasperation is clear and evident. Let them just do their jobs and fill prescriptions. I don’t need them blowing up my phone with nonsense.
I do have a couple of personal experiences I must relay concerning one of your pharmacy counter people. I don’t know her name because she was not wearing a nametag which is most likely in violation of company dress code. But I can tell you she has dark hair. Anyways, during one of these encounters, I was told by her that I could NOT buy Sudafed for someone else. (My wife was home sick and needed it). What? Why!? Luckily, a tall, thin blonde girl (somewhat resembling the Elven Commander of the Northern Armies, Galadriel) stepped in and got it for me. I could tell she was frustrated by Miss Dumb Bunny’s lack of competence. I’m thankful she was helpful, but she was also a little bit mean, which I can understand. I know these people must have to put up with jerks every single day. (As well as BS corporate edicts). We on the other side of the counter are not without our faults.
Anyways, a second encounter with Miss Dumb Bunny included her frightfully apparent lack of knowledge of drug names / uses for. She seemed to be stunned into submission by big, scientific words. I realize that she is not a licensed pharmacist, but she works in a pharmacy! Should she not have a reasonable level of knowledge of her field when she’s handing out pills? It is concerning that these people without proper education / training / skills are dealing with medication for HUMAN BEINGS. And I will note again, this is not Taco Bell. Yet you seem to require no higher knowledge or skill set to work in a pharmacy. I need pills for my nervous disorder (which is continually exacerbated by trips to Walgreens), not a bean burrito or chimichanga with a refreshing ice-cold Mountain Dew.
Look, I get it. You all hate customers. People suck. People are rude, hateful, selfish, unclean. Everyone would much rather be home doing a craft they love instead of trying to make a living pedaling products and services to complete A-holes just to make someone else rich. Our hearts and souls are just not into this capitalistic garbage. This whole scene, man. It’s just not what we were destined to do. You know, as a people. This is just not in our DNA, that of which was structured eons ago on a distant planet in a distant galaxy. We were not made for Earth — don’t you see? This star is too close. Tis the reason you all sell sunglasses and sunscreen.
Yet your corporate gods keep feeding us this crap via commercials depicting glowing beings in ivory lab coats servicing our every need with big, fake smiles full of perfectly white teeth. All the money spent on PR advertising hogwash — how many people could we feed, clothe, cure, and house? The world could be a very different place indeed.
But here we are. Grinding away and killing ourselves and for what? A lousy paycheck that just doesn’t fit the bill — literally. We live our lives within the twisted veil of panic, worry, and stress. All because of the evil dollar. But hey, let’s worship our overflowingly rich slave masters. Let us bow to orange-faced passers of flatulence. Hopefully he won’t have to wait too long in line at Walgreens to get some medicine for that. Oh boy.
So, there you have it, enthusiastic, high-fiving Walgreens management team. My pharmacy frustrations spilled upon a paper platter and digital device. I suspect nothing will change and the next time I go in to pick up a prescription I will be greeted with a disgruntled long line and a clerk who doesn’t know a popular injectable antidiabetic medication needs to be refrigerated and spends 15 minutes looking all over the place for it (except in the refrigerator). Doink!
In a cold and dark windy hallway called my deepest sigh I look out upon the swaying, bubbling sky champagne sunsets turn to ebony nights with a big hole filled with a creamy, clouded moon deep-seeded memories skirmish in my head another day, another dry heave to the wind the pots are rolling with the boiling steam rising up to paint the walls wet white and I down in the stratosphere beneath my floor hard to look up and listen to the fuming world painted with the illicit acts of the damaged mind.
CEREAL AFTER SEX 