Thirty-Year Record Ruined!

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

Somewhere in the neighborhood of thirty years ago I got into a dispute with a Walmart store mnaager over a photo that I needed copied for an adoption packet of a foster child who was on my caseload.  I had one school photo of the boy and desperately needed one more.  The store employee in the photo department declined my request saying they could not copy school photos, so I elevated my displeasure to the store manager, a pimply-faced young man who looked to maybe be in his mid-twenties, and he said the photo was copyrighted and his store therefore could not reproduce it. 

I carefully explained why I needed the photo copied, but the manager would not budge.  I also pointed out that that there was no copyright mark on the photo, and still he stood firm like an underpaid and under-appreciated Missouri mule.  Knowing he was probably right, but being pissed off nevertheless, I told the manager, in a pleasant manner, that I was leaving and would not be returning, and he looked pleased in his anticipation of finally seeing the back of me.  The silly man thought I meant that I would not be returning to his store, but I meant that I would not be returning to any Walmart.

I was a bit of a Missouri mule myself!

But a year or so later I did go back to Walmart, and even to that same store.  My father was in the hospital and he was so ill that it looked as though he might have only a few days of life left in him.  I was spending the night in his room sleeping in a nearby chair when Dad woke up in the middle of the night asking for a peppermint candy.  There was no candy in the room, but he was insistent, so I drove across town to get a bag of peppermints from the only store open that late - Walmart.  And that was the actual last time that I ever set foot in a Walmart store - until yesterday.

(My primary grievance with Walmart is that it shut down America's Main Streets and public squares and put most little stores and Mom and Pop operations out of business, including the appliance store that my Dad had owned for twenty years before the concept of chain stores took over America - thanks to Walmart.   Also, the family that founded and still owns a major stake in Walmart is, with only a couple of exceptions, not especially known for its charitable giving.)

Yesterday, as noted in this space, I surprised myself by running out of insulin.  I take three shots of that particular insulin a day, and did not even have any for my morning shot.  It was Sunday and my pharmacy was closed.  At 1:00 p.m. I went to a local walk-in clinic (a part of the same clinic where my regular doctor works) hoping to get an emergency supply of insulin or at least a shot.  They could provide neither.  So then I went to the local hospital's emergency room, a process that is never quick, and waited in a crowded room for my name to be called.  When I finally saw a nurse, all she could do was to provide me with an emergency prescription to the only pharmacy that was open within miles - Walmart!

Hungry, out-of-sorts, and very shaky, I got in my car and headed across town to Walmart.  I have lived in this town for over eleven years, and that was my first visit to the community's de facto social club.  As I entered the store, the first thing I noticed was it was not nearly as crowded as what I had expected,  There were plenty of employees hustling around restocking shelves, and it seemed like they might even outnumber the customers.  

I asked a gaggle of employees where the pharmacy was located, and fortunately I had entered through the correct door and was just twenty feet or so from my destination.  I walked very gingerly to the pharmacy over what looked like highly polished cement floors.   There I checked on my order which wasn't ready, provided some information and a couple of signatures, and sat on a nearby bench watching the foot traffic until the my order had been filled.  Then I very carefully made my way across the slick-looking floor, to the door, to my car in the parking lot, and ultimately home where I took a hot shower and burned some incense.

My thirty-year run had been ruined, so now I am starting over,   In thirty more years I will only be a hundred and seven!

(The lady who waited on me at the Walmart pharmacy in West Plains, Missouri, yesterday, was very nice, btw.)