For a while in the 1990s we were full brakes and full speed ahead.  People were getting the economy back on track and we all discovered: you can't do that without being in your life.  Even the people in denial and fighting that basic factor were worked over by group dynamics which required presence.

  This was before 4000 choices of energy drink and a non-profit craze.  The world seemed split like an atom....came up, uh, what word do we say now?  Us young people had had good educations and had  already started down the roads to, all fresh and excited about "the American dream" and the promises of a prosperous nation.  Our middle agers were towing "the mainstream" and losing the Greatest Generation.  Our mentors and leaders were not in Washington.  Not except for visits and carrying the batons to the face we need to put on.

  "You're fucking kidding me?"  A manager was sucking a cigarette in two drags and letting the body fluids and drinks ooze out of a trash bag before carting it to a dumpster.  He'd whittled his entire vocabulary down to those four words though he'd studied philosophy and psychology.  It didn't matter if "the news" was good or bad.  "Yah," an out-of-work Ukrainian mechanic said back.  "Is he?" The manager asked a co-worker.  The co-worker shrugged and walking away loudly mumbled, "How the fuck would I know if he's fucking kidding you?"

  "What this mean 'kidding'?"  The Ukrainian asked me.

  "Means faking or pretending," I told the mechanic's girlfriend.  She translated and the man's face fell out of the trying to uphold smile--new day.  He pointed his finger at the manager and said something in Ukrainian.  The girlfriend translated: "Don't point at me." The finger then pointed at the sky and he asked the girlfriend to explain, he shouldn't be accused of breaking the pipes, that's bullshit, and he'd explained he was a mechanic and not a plumber.  "Did he tell me that in English?"

  A squid of an electric sound zapped and hissed.  Cooler lights flckered then kah-put'd.  Workers sighed and frowned.  The boombox kept playing.  And stockers who'd worked up to letting their personalities "shine" but only at work pulled dance moves with inventory and mentally wrote if this was a movie.  "You're fucking kidding me?" The manager asked the ceiling.

  In the parking lot a makeshift team of kind of like human resources rotating assistant managers tried to sort which stores were at what exit.  Highway traffic had been picking back up and, too young to sell alcohol; if that one's there until the other one's kids come home from school; just left, the MOD or the manager of the store?  A mounting list of snafus and issues per new policy demands.  A pot of coffee.  Highlighters rainbowing schedules and reports.  "Are you really Human Resources?" A guy in a shirt and tie under his tee shirt asked.  "No, but we're people who care."

  "Good because I've been sent to four different stores this week.  This is only Wednesday.  And I'm out of gas."

  Between the pay and the debts and the mis-spending of budget and the unforseen costs of damaged property, just go to work and work was becoming nearly impossible for most everyone.  As was getting through a day without confrontation between people not working and workers.  One visiting manager had off-the-record taught us by example that the store couldn't also be "social services". She'd recite not my problem, not my problem before having to approach on the nod in front of the pumps, or, piling up groups of people waiting for an EBT holder.  Then she'd diplomat.  Maybe one out of six people needed to PARK IT OVER THERE OR IT WILL BE TOWED.  Some people got out of steaming vehicles with hands up, waving, NOT ON ANYTHING.

  Some of the days in a final phase of the last free stuff UNLESS....find a program....for your friend then....were a crush of rambling inactivity even while previously "laid back" workers were drilled on not succumbing to apathy.

  "Wassthat?"

  "Not caring."

  "And if you don't care about yourself, just so you know, most of us are FILLED UP."

  A woman with big hair piled under a floppy painter's hat shook her head, no, not me either.  

  I have my own to care for was implied.

  An abundance of people showed up in the mornings at stores on the highways and all over in the mountains.  Political frozen-over was in a thaw.  There were, of course, people who kept on being political.  And there were those feeling ousted, so fine ah-ga-me-su.  An older woman gasped then pressed her lips together.  Then walked over to a man painting and whapped him on the back of the head.  "How dare you teach younger people to curse in Greek." He smirked.  A manager called out, "That's a cuss?!"

  "Why?"

  "Told me it was a friendly greeting." The manager put a hand over his mouth.  Shook his head.  "And on a Sunday, so you know who I cussed."

  The painting man smirked harder and winked.  "Perfect world, not so perfect eh?!" He dripped paint on the shoulder of the older woman. 

  "Because your recovery is yours, get it?" Other workers had worked through a short list of blames and excuses and into a daily sort of okay and not okay on the agenda.  Apparently a couple, someone mouthed.

  "Okay, so this hand-held device makes your labels," a visiting manager started to explain.  Someone asked, "Who drowned ours in IPA?"

  "Come on I'll show you how on this one."