One Of Those Oh Shit Moments

It was another beautiful weekend in San Jose. Like most of the people in the city I had been impatiently waiting for the summer weather to finally start being a bit more regular, and as it seemed this was to be a really great day in the sun. I usually start my days with a ritualistic bowl of oatmeal; no sugar no milk, just plain old pasty tasting mush and raisins. I first started the practice of gagging down this bowl of glue and lumps after my seemingly healthy and relatively young father took a trip to the hospital in response to a month long orgy with procrastination and chest pain. I say orgy because my father is the biggest procrastinator I know. My old man puts everything off until the very last minute, usually creating a blitzkrieg of emotional and financial instability, he does this so much that I am convinced he is in love with the whole process. They say that procrastination is “The Thief Of Time”. His love gave him a trip to the hospital and a double bypass an hour later. He was minutes from having a massive heart attack and a possible young and very anticlimactic death. So from now on it’s just me and my homies for breakfast, I’ve got the Quaker Oatmeal man, his double chins smiling back at me from his cholesterol killing cylinder, and the little Sun-Maid mistress, her huge basket of grapes to accompany her “life is so wonderful in the fields today” depiction. I guess picking grapes in Fresno 1915 was the place to be, I doubt that this is the case these days. I’m sitting on my couch shoveling this mess into my face as quickly as possible, swirling and gulping the tasteless mass in my mouth, the only relief comes when I manage to get a spoonful with a raisin or two in it, and then in its sudden sweetness thoughts of the immortality this morning ritual will bring die and are resurrected over and over again within every other bite I take. I managed to finish my bowl, sucked down the rest of my cup of assitone from Pete’s, got into my car and split for my favorite spot.

Santana Row can be a bit overwhelming for those timid with their wallets, and even more insane for half of the miniature inbred dogs walking around with their “clueless of everyone else” owners. This is a place for the “affluent”, those not afraid to drop a 50 for a little lunch and a good strong drink, or there are those like me who sit at the outdoor tequila bar ordering eight dollar appetizers and ten dollar mojitas not taking any of it or anyone else all that seriously. I go to Santana Row mainly for the people. I am a people watcher. I can sit for hours and just watch. And as it was this day the weather was amazing and the girls and their summer dresses were out in full force. I am a man and have little shame, I love good conversation more than anything, but second to that is a beautiful woman in a summer dress, ok so who am I kidding, actually it’s the whole female species. I walked around for a bit admiring the art shops and good restaurants. I finally sat down at a French restaurant and enjoyed a leg of lamb sandwich and some palm frits, two glasses of wine and a conveyor belt of summer dresses and nice legs. I finished eating and left for the bookstore.

Usually when I walk into Borders Books I am able to remain anonymous and enjoy myself throughout the “experience” but not today, this is were the real story begins and a life is changed forever. As I walk in the double doors I expect to hear and feel the familiar whoosh of air escaping the store, this sends a signal to my brain immediately releasing dopamine into my body, as I start to relax, eyes slowly glazing over I become something other than a man in a bookstore, a zombie feeding on the pages of random literature. My father and I both have this in common, he gets the strange glaze also when he eats, sort of a meditative state, a oneness with the universe brought on by spice and experience in the kitchen, my father is the king of sauerkraut and spare ribs, the yogi of fried bologna sandwiches. Instead of reaching a state of “Total Understanding” I am ambushed by a middle-aged man that closely resembles the crazy dork character Milton from the movie Office Space. He was strategically placed ten feet from the entrance doors completely and utterly in perfect alignment with the center of them both. I imagine in my head Borders Books hiring a crazed physicist from the Stanford Linear Accelerator Project to set this mans little desk up, to scientifically suck people in like a black hole of empty greetings and salutations. How are you, he bellowed like a train conductor “I’m good thanks I replied, but instead of ending the conversation there, I being a little buzzed from the whine I had just finished made the mistake of asking how he was doing. You see normally I am very intuitive about these kinds of people, you know the kind you just smile at, or give a quick approving nod to and keep on walking past them, you know like a fat bum holding a sign that says “homeless need money for food”, just keep on walking. not me, not today. I was sucked into the abyss away from what I wanted and stuck with a madman. “Well I just got published, so you know what I’m doing pretty darn good”. Oh you’re a writer? Published that’s great, good for you. I am a writer as well, so what’s the book about? Shit I did it again, what the hell had come over me, was this guy like some sort of dorky Jedi master using mind control and imposing his dark will on me, why couldn’t I just smile, nod and get the fuck out of there. So he told me about the book, I didn’t listen. “So it’s all been such a great experience, If you would have told me I would be her doing this today 6 months ago I wouldn’t believe you” he was rapping it up I hoped. “That’s great I said, I’ll take two. What the fuck was going on, what was I thinking, what was I doing. Wow two, well ok he joyfully chuckled as he signed them and handed them to me. I thanked him and got the hell out of the kill zone as quickly as possible.

Shit I said as I walked away, that was one of those painful moments in social interaction you never want to go through again, and then I looked at the price tag, HOLY SHIT! I gasped within earshot of a man and his six year old son, twenty five fucking dollars for each I said softly. Goddamn it I thought as I walked around with these two over priced just released lapses in judgment under arm trying to pull some shred of enjoyment out of this Borders on oblivion experience. So I walk around and it only took me a second to realize that leaving the signed books at the store without paying for them would be the wrong choice, besides the karma factor would more than likely come up when I finally got off my as and published my own book. No I would suck it up pay for the books, leave the real books I wanted inside the store and go home, head held high and proud for remaining a person of good standing in my own heart, how could I have even thought of pulling an asshole move like that. I made my way towards the register only to realize that I had to hit the restroom on the other side of the store before I left, I turned around and headed for the bathroom. “Please Do Not Bring Un-purchased Items Into The Restroom” read the sign on the men’s restroom door. I decided to leave the two un-purchased stacks of fire kindling at the pay phone outside of the bathroom. For some reason deep down I knew that no one would take them, though I prayed one of the little ants that worked there would come and take them away, back to the colony for winter food storage, saved for a time when all the preferred stock was running low, and there was no other choice but to consume the tuff grit.

I walked in the restroom and waited for my turn at the urinal. As I waited I briefly noticed this man standing in front of the stall, which happened to be right next to the urinal as it usually does waiting for his turn, it wasn’t until I was at the urinal pissing away that I realized I had noticed the man waiting his turn at the stall to look a little concerned, a little red in the face so to speak, just then he burst into the stall like seabiscuit leaving the gate, I shot a little grin to the graffiti scratched tile in front of me, because at that moment I realized I had also noticed him doing what could best be described as the Poopoo Dance. What happened next shocked and terrified me, I heard the jingle of a belt being loosened, the shuffle and pivot of shoes carrying the weight of a man about to be delivered into the arms of a porcelain savior. I was not to be as lucking. To the best of my creative mind I can only imaging that what happened next was that this dancing, red faced, horse racer of a mans ass exploded like a fucking claymore mine prior to being completely and fully seated on the toilette. During this explosion of liquid shit and digested food particles there was no sound of passing gas, this immediately made me question and really hope that this was not really happening, part of some stupid hidden camera show or to that effect. The sound it did make though was one of a splatter, almost exactly like it sounds in one of the Alien movies when the alien creeps up behind someone and opens it’s mouth, and then they quickly pan away and you here the sound if the ballistic tongue mouth thing crushing into someone’s skull and you then her that splatter sound it could have been an alien in there, for all I know maybe there was one in his ass, I didn’t care because as soon as I heard the sound came the feeling, the feeling of something hitting my bare leg, I prayed that it was blood but looked down and only saw a splatter of liquid crap on the ground and a large splatter of shit streaking down my leg. Mind you no amount of shit on your body especially someone else’s is ever a small amount. My head then moved into a defensive mental posture, one where everything slows down and there is clarity and no fear at all only reaction. As the shit ran down my leg the bathroom was strangely silent, there were other men waiting to use the urinal but they said nothing as I finished and moved slowly back from the stall in total fear that any sudden movements might cause another explosion. I thought about what I was going to do about this, should I kill him? Should I kick open the stall door and scream at the top of my lungs, You Fucking Asshole You Shit On My Leg and then kill him. But wait first is always the option to just get the shit off of you and that’s what I decided to do. I stood there with my leg in the sink washing this guys ass off, all the while burning a hole through the stall door with my eyes, when I came to the conclusion that this was a sign not to be dismissed. I finished washing my leg and quickly walked strait through the bookstore, past the pay phone, past the 50.00 dollars worth of pain and suffering, past the “just published” author, opened the double doors and with a whoosh of familiar air I was free from the ever-expanding nightmare that was found that day in Borders Music And Books.