… so there I was, sitting in the food court of the mall after putting in a particularly annoying eleven hour shift at work: it’s Sunday, new price changes are all over the department, the biggest group in the store this week, and half of the new prices I’d been given have incorrect pricing or are the wrong size or the wrong product: I’m wasting vaulable time sifting through them all trying to get the ad set before I leave. First I have to take down three hundred-odd old stickers and sizes before I put up the thousand-odd NEW signs for this week. It’s going slowly but steadily in the morning, but it gets more difficult later in the day. The electronics department is getting slammed hard by the after-church crowd from one o’ clock on, people crowding the aisles buying up TVs and peripheral electronic gear left and right, I’m paranoid about getting everything just right since I got to work late anyway and I’m desperately playing catch-up all day long. This many customers makes it that much more stressful. But, y’know, the kid is game, right? I dig in, I make up new signs, clean the floors, restock some other shelves, hang some new fixtures, stop whatever I’m doing to help the ever-desperate customers find things they’re looking for, restock all the DVDs in the four outlying displays just outside the department, even though I’m interrupted every five minutes by customers asking me things like, “Do you have a bathroom?” or “Where can I buy the internet here? It’s for my grandson.” or " Can’t you give me some kinda break on these prices? C’mon, hook a brother up."
I hate my job.
The irony is I do it well.
I skipped both of my fifteen minute breaks and my half hour UNPAID lunch to finish. Right when I was straightening up and restocking the DVD section (not my job, but it needs to be done) I’m given the cheerful news some customers have knocked down a sign from the ceiling I’d hung up earlier that week when someone knocked it down THEN. Screw that. I clock out ten minutes early, grabbed my headset from my locker, run out the store, ordered my breakfast/lunch/dinner from Mickey Dee’s and just sat there and ate and stewed, music blaring from my MP3 player.
I understand SOME people listen to soft, relaxing music to undwind from work. I must try that sometime. Me? I listen to gangsta rap. Because when I’ve had a shitty day listening to Bing Crosby singing “Silver Bells” for about the eighty millionth time on the PA system around a bunch of holiday shoppers, there’s nothing like listening to angry black millionaires bitching about some punkass bitch that needs to have the taste slapped out their mouths that, I dunno, I can somehow relate to.
The bullshit, the drama (uhh), the guns, the armor (what?)
The city, the farmer, the babies, the mama (what?!)
The projects, the drugs (uhh!), the children, the thugs
(uhh!) The tears, the hugs, the love, the slugs (c’mon!)
The funerals, the wakes, the churches, the coffins (uhh!)
The heartbroken mothers, it happens, too often (why?!)
The problems, the things, we use, to solve 'em (what?!)
So then, just when I’m just beginning to feel relaxed, I catch this lil’ tow headed Dennis the Menace-looking five year old white kid dancing next me.
Clearly he can hear my music. Maybe I should turn it down so he can stop.
But I don’t wanna. I just want him to stop wiggling his ass to my angry man music.
I throw him a thug mug. This usually makes grown white women who see me with this look on clutch their purses and move to the other side of the elevator.
But this lil’ white kid is just obliviously shaking his lil’ ass off to DMX, and now, as my music changes, to Ice Cube, MC Ren and Dr. Dre on “Hello.”
*I started this gangsta shit
And this the motherfuckin thanks I get? (Hello!)
The motherfuckin world is a ghetto
Full of magazines, full clips, and heavy metal
When the smoke settle…
… I’m just lookin for a big yellow;
in six inch stilletos…*
Does any of the lyrics give him pause? Hell, no. There he goes, shaking his narrow ass while he’s munching on his cheeseburger. I notice for the first time he’s wearing a Spongebob t-shirt.
Oh, this will never do.
I skip the menu up to a third selection. AND I turn up the volume to “20.”
Fuck them other niggas cause I’m down for my niggas!
Fuck them other niggas cause I’m down for my niggas!
Fuck them other niggas, I ride for my niggas,
I die for my niggas, fuck them other niggas!
Fuck them other niggas cause I’m down for my niggas!
Fuck them other niggas cause I’m down for my niggas,
Fuck them other niggas, I ride for my niggas,
I die for my niggas, fuck them other niggas!
This little motherfucker is still dancing. Just wagging his ass!
I see his mom take notice and direct him to sit down.
He ignores her and keeps dancing his little ass off.
She motions to me to take off my headset so she can talk to me.
Ah, I think, gloating. Here it comes. She will, of course, complain and I will righteously ignore her ass until she drags her son off in a huff.
“Do mind turning it down for a minutes, until he finishes eating? That’s his favorite song!” :eek:
I walk out in the cold parking lot and I do not feel relaxed or in any way vindicated. I am undone.
My scariest, angriest, blackest music has become old hat for the Spongebob set.
Thanks cute lil’ white boy.