It's A Sunday Thing

So yesterday I was on call. This means that I get to wait around all day until a manager calls (around 4) to see if I am needed or not. Being on call usually means I don't have to work but there are some days when they do ask, and expect, you to come in if they need you.

I wasn't terribly in a good mood yesterday (allergies) so when 4 came around and no one call I sort of put my phone on vibrate and prayed that they wouldn't need me to help close the store. I thought I was in the clear until I got a call from work at 7. I answered only because I need the money and if that means dragging my snotty ass to work..well then so be it. But my manager was not calling for that. She wanted to know if I could take Lisa's schedule on Sunday because she is moving into a new place. Lisa was scheduled to work 10-6, I was only scheduled to work 6-closing. So naturally I told my manager that I would have no problem taking Lisa's time.

It's been rainy the last couple of days which is weird because last week it was 90 degrees. Friday it was a deadly shade of grey outside and the clouds sort of hoovered. Luckily Lenny and the French dude did not send me running all over the place, because by 2pm the rain came pouring down. Today it was pretty much the same, grey and cloudy. You would think this would keep people inside. But no. Not in Westchester county where parents have more time on their hands then should be allowed. Today was a weird chaotic mess of people who didn't want to keep their children inside and people who should have stayed inside.

There is this regular customer-I use that term lightly- There is this regular guy who comes into the store with a huge disco colored shopping bag. It is the most ostentatious thing I have ever seen in my whole entire life, and the first time I saw him walking around the store I could only think to myself "what a weird thing to use as a purse". It goes beyond a purse, it is this ugly yellow bag you would get at some party store. Putting two and two together we quickly figured out that this guy is really a kleptomaniac and the bag is where he stuffs all his shit. Every time him and his yellow bag comes in we are on high alert. It's sort of funny because the bag draws so much attention to him. When the store lights hit the bag it glitters and could literally cause a glare. Our heads turn, we whisper "oh shit the bag guy is here" and then take turns asking him if he needs help while peering into his bag. I think his bag holds the secret of the world in it.

Anyway, it was my turn to follow him around today. But for a bag guy, he is pretty quick. One minute I had the glare of the sparkly shopping bag in my view the next I couldn't find the guy for the longest time. By the time I did see him he was near the exit. Someone says he has weird padding in the bag and that's why he can stuff crap in it without the alarm going off. Nevertheless he is one of the more interesting guys who comes in. And in some weird way we look forward to seeing him because then we have something to do for a while.

I am super nervous about telling my managers that I will be leaving June 1st. I have finally decided on a date. I will get to celebrate Michelle's birthday and enjoy my last days in Westchester before I head home to Small Town USA. I have been conflicted about this in many ways. I love my job. I love the people I work with. And for the most part it is an easy gig. So yes, I have to keep listening to people ask for books like To Kill A Mockingbird without knowing who the author is. And I admit it, I give them a "it's Harper Lee you asshole" look before taking them to the book. So maybe I have to pretend like I care about a book I will never read as a customer goes on and on about how I should read it because it will change my life. But, I love my job. In a weird way. I do.

I never had a job in high school. My mom never pushed the issue on me and I never wanted to make money. Seriously. I barely know what to do with the money I make now. So in a weird way my time at the Bookstore has been a fun high school-isque job where I spend more time talking to my work buddies then helping customers. This does not mean that I do not take book selling seriously but there are often times when I am talking to one of my 'friends' and a customer comes up to us as if we should drop everything to attend to them and all I want to do is turn to the customer lingering at the desk tapping their fingers on the counter and tell them 'hey can you come back in a few. I'm sort of talking here'.

I will miss that.

My mom wants me to take a plane home because I will get to my house in a New York Minute. But I am not a fan of planes. In a weird way I would like to leave this place just like I entered it...on a train looking out the window feeling like I have so much possibility. It will be a long train ride but I wouldn't mind. I could get my own little room, and not have to fight over the window seat. It will give me time to think and process the last 8-9 months of my life. I could read and stare out the window and just breathe...something I have not done in a very long time.

I keep forgetting how nice it is to do that everyone once in a while.

Time to read. I am on my third Bret Easton Ellis novel. I may be a little obsessed. I flew through The Informers and Less Than Zero, but I am not really feeling American Psycho. I want to get into it, but for some reason I just keep putting it down. I have the whole week off and I should make a dent in it. I think I should also start working on some more stories. I hate when people walk into the store asking for writing books as if reading "how to get write a novel for dummies" makes them a writer all of a sudden. I should just start a whole new journal called "that irks me" because if writing is so difficult for me how can some guy or girl off the street come into the store looking for those books, get it done? I can't fathom it being that easy.