Usually I'd be reading about now, but Peter DeVries's Blood of the Lamb hits a bit too close to home to be truly funny. Today's not a day for dark and angry satire, anyway. I had a heartwarming moment in the grocery store that I wanted to share.
Checking out at Publix yesterday, I was frustrated and not in the mood for small talk. The stupid Red Box machine had the audacity to be broken, and not when I wanted to rent a movie-- oh no! It only refused to let me return the movie I'd already watched. (Which, by the way, if you want to watch gripping performances from Maggie Gyllenhaal and Viola Davis, Won't Back Down is well worth a rental.) I inserted the DVD at least three times, THE CORRECT WAY, while the screen insisted that I wasn't placing the red arrow "facing the machine with barcode out." Except the arrow was facing the machine with barcode out AND YET IT REFUSED! The rationality of flipping out about spending one extra dollar on my movie rental is questionable, but don't mess with a girl on a mission.
My rage at the stupid tomato-colored rectangular prism had almost escalated into a full-on tantrum by the time I gave up and bought my stupid sunscreen anyway. My mother was standing next to me in the checkout line, and our cashier was an adorably foreign woman of Asian descent. She had a thick accent and a broad smile, and asked if I was my mother's daughter while scanning my SPF 50. We smiled and nodded, and she remarked, "Oooooo, very tall!"
Being 5'9," I get this a lot. My mom barely cracks five feet, so the height is note-worthy in comparison. My dad's over six feet, so our old joke is that my mother wanted daughters with long legs and brains. Possessing the brains herself, she had to marry the legs.
 |
| Not quite the face of a beauty queen. |
"Excuse me, ma'am?"
"Miss Universe! You know, with the sash and da-da-da" she sang the little anthem while pantomiming the signature Beauty Queen Wave. I let out a guffaw.
"OH! Hah! Yeah, we'll see about that. I don't know if I'm the pageant type."
"Yes, your hair too short," she said, ruffling her own wiry black strands. "But don't grow out! We have first short-hair winner. Miss Universe with the short! Hahaha!" She supplied the laughter herself, finally acknowledging the joke of it all.
Despite myself, I walked away from the grocery store with a huge grin on my face.
I don't know why this little episode warmed my heart so much. Whether it was the unexpected kindness from a stranger in my most frustrated hour, or the reminder of the importance of patience and placing human interaction above my life's unnecessarily hectic pace, or even just the small, round-about compliment. I'm not perfect, and I'm not always confident in how I look. BUT HEY, I could be Miss Universe one day and SO COULD YOU!
 |
| Obligatorily uplifting blogpost ending! ~Complete with unrelated sunglasses picture~ |
