For the average American, jobs are a crucial part of life, as many Americans enter the workforce as teenagers. That is the subsection that I fall into, the minimum wage scraps that fall down from our one-percenter CEOs. These minimum wage jobs tend to be generally quite annoying, but my experience this one night will go down to be one of the most miserable nights of my life.
For legal reasons, I cannot disclose where this took place nor my coworkers’ names, so fake names and a fake name of a store will be used instead.
Act I: The Initiation
To start off this awful anecdote, the setting should be addressed. I was scheduled to go to work at 3 pm and stay until 10 pm. This was very normal, as this is what I always worked on this day. However, before I went to work, I had gone to lunch with my mother and grandfather. While it was nice, I was hoping that I would have time before work to mentally prepare myself for it. Sadly, this was not the case, as on the drive back home, I had a small fight with my mother. Nothing too big, but it was enough for me to be upset when going to work.
Act II: The Beginning
I walked in, as voices buzzed around me, I already had a queasy stomach feeling about this day. A part of my job is to go into the parking lot and collect carts. This is usually fine, but this day, it was windy. So incredibly windy. And I am not someone who puts their hair up, so wind was already starting to get to me.
My first run, I was pushing these carts into their corral next to the store. A man in a drivable cart crashed into the automatic sliding doors, pushing them out of socket. Luckily, it was an easy fix, but that should have set my this-isn’t-going-to-be-an-easy-day alarm off.
After I had finished with the carts, I went to talk to my boss, who then informed me that three cashiers had called out of work, meaning that the only cashiers for the whole night were my friend and the Head Cashier, who had plenty of other tasks they needed to do to close. She also informed me that the grocer – the employee that stocks the shelves and makes the products look nice – had also called out, meaning that I had to help with that along with my other responsibilities. This already was a bit annoying, as Sundays -the day this happened- are our most busy days, but I knew I could manage it.
Act III: The Rapture
A few hours start to tick away, the sun starts to set, minutes turn to hours. That is when the slow descent to madness starts. I heard my name ring through the intercom, beckoning me to produce. With haste and a small touch of fear, I speed walk to my destination. I arrived and my fear was quickly justified as I looked at the ground, which had splashes of white substance covering it. Spotting a single tub of yogurt laying on the ground beside it, I quickly understood the situation. A customer is apologizing, but I reassure her that everything is okay. I run to grab my cleaning supplies while weaving in between customers. I cleaned up the mess as fast as my scrawny arms could, which was surprisingly fast.
After I finished cleaning up, my boss came running up to me, slightly out of breath when she told me to do nothing but face (pushing products up in the shelves) the whole night. Keep in mind, there were still about 4 hours left in my shift, meaning that she didn’t want me to do any of my closing responsibilities. I was frustrated because I didn’t want to get yelled at for not doing my closing activities, but the manager told me not to, so I agreed.
Seconds continued to count down slowly while I juggled grabbing carts, sweeping the whole store, and facing the whole night. My social battery was fastly depleting and I felt like I was one rude comment away from being fired, so I went to ask my boss if I could go to lunch. She reluctantly agreed, so I rushed off to get some substance into my body. I had gone to grab food from a local burrito restaurant nearby, but it was very busy, so a third of my lunch was wasted waiting in line. Still frustrated, I just tried to enjoy my overpriced burrito in my car. Despite it being a little disappointing, I still felt more equipped for the rest of my shift.
Act IV: All Hell Broke Loose
This is the part of the night that utterly broke me. It started when I had gone out to do another cart run. Still windy, I was not ready for the rest of the night. I had gathered my lot, but a car stood directly in my path, just sitting in a lane. I had waited for a second before I begrudgingly moved them to go up another direction. After I finished my run, the car was still there, so, as a completely sane and not at all slightly deranged person, I got into my car and physically went behind it, making the car drive back into the parking lot. Luckily, the car immediately moved because if it didn’t, I would’ve started honking like a madman.
I went inside after that and I was already gone, just trying to sway along with the wave and listening to the same 20 songs that repeat in the background. That is until my boss, once again, runs up to me and says that she really needs me to be facing the entire store because there was an “incident” in a part of the store and that someone was hurt. Before I could say anything, she was running off to go deal with it. Confused and concerned, I ran to my friend and asked what had happened. Apparently, the man that was in the deli- the place that makes sandwiches and pre-made meals- had almost completely cut off his finger. The color in my face vanished as I asked if he was okay.
“Of course not, he almost cut his pinky finger off!” my friend exclaimed. “He probably is driving to the hospital right now”. I didn’t know how to react to this except laugh, simply saying that this night has been the worst shift of my life.
Act IIII: The Lull
After that, I had tried to stay up in the front with my friend, ducking and dodging my boss so I wouldn’t bear her wrath. The rest of the night ticked down slowly, inching towards closing. Luckily, the night took a calmer end with all of my coworkers standing at the front, waiting to call our closing announcements.
But of course, there must be a cherry to put atop this humbling sundae.
The final customer sauntered up to the register, grinning ear to ear. He put his few products onto the conveyor belt, waited patiently for them to be rang up. The total was around $15, to which this man slams down his plastic bag, filled with coins. The final customer paid in coins. With a collective pain in all of our eyes, we spent the next 10 minutes counting coins and trying to refrain from screaming at this man.
After he left, it was a strong 10:12 at night when I and everyone else marched to go clock out for the night. I slipped into my car and scrolled through my music to find a fitting song to end my night. Nothing quite fit, so I rode home in pure silence, my eyes barely being able to stay open. Once I was home, I stumbled in to take my medications and I fell into bed, almost immediately falling asleep.
There was nothing left of me to give, yet I continued to march through the day that single handedly ripped my soul out of my body, shredded it, and then shoved it back into my chest. Somehow, I was able to smile and laugh about it. That should be how people manage challenging days, being able to laugh about it. And even if I can’t laugh, at least I got something out of it- A ridiculous story.
