i need a sign that'll make my life make some kind of sense.
i throw two grapefruits and a couple raw food bars in my lunch bag and slam out the back door. while the car heats up i write you that that's what i'm doing-- asking god for a sign. the car doesn't like to back up when it's cold, but today isn't too cold. fingers crossed.
so,to reiterate. god. i need a sign today that explains my life. i need it to make sense. thanks. :)
i back up. hardly a shutter. i drive to the end of the row, turn, turn again. now i'm headed to the exit. i'm almost there when i get a text. maybe it's the boss man texting me to say he's late and i will dodge the bullet of being late two days in a row.
i stop. i dig out the cell from my tiny little purse. it's kyle, my new wine rep.
"i will be delivering your order today so do not be alarmed when it does not come by regular delivery."
"k"
my pain level was higher today. maybe because yesterday was the last day of the furniture sale, so i was pulling furniture for people all day yesterday. the door is unlocked when i check, which is unusual, but which reduces my embarrassment for my lateness, fifteen minutes, which is extremely late for me. i go clock in seventeen minutes late.
i check the beer wall. we don't really need anything. i should get something. because we'll sell beer over the weekend for the superbowl. maybe they'll be some new seasonals. i check the email. markdowns thursday. no signage for chocolate beer which might or might not be on sale for the all chocolate is on sale day. glad i ordered up on that.
"did you see the email from megan about how you were number one"
"are you talking about the case sale thing from the other day? i saw that. but i'm only 80 units up on the woodlands, so not that impressive."
"they're beating you in percentage, but you are beating them in sales."
"well yeah. but not by the kind of numbers it should be. the heights is definitely hurting my sales. what i don't get is why they are keeping track of percentages. why is it better if more of my department sales are case sale sales-- we make less money on them. is it just to show we're pushing the program? and, if so, does college station not push the program; i thought they were program pushers from way back but their percentage is only like thirty."
"they aren't old enough."
"to have money to buy a case?"
"to buy alcohol. they're college kids."
"but then they don't go into the percentage at all, it's case sale total to dept total."
"they don't have our customers, they just have a bunch of people wandering through
"oh, i finished that paperwork."
"what paperwork?"
"the stuff you said i needed to have finished before wednesday when you left town. you probably saw it was in there, but i wanted to let you know that that's all of it."
"yeah, every once in a while i say something managerial. tell kevin i said something managerial monday."
we had actually had the conversation on saturday. i had told him i might not finish it on saturday. i did, in fact, finish it on saturday. i had just forgotten to tell him it was all complete when i had seen him on monday.
kyle came with the order.
it had gotten messed up somehow and he didn't want to have it not come again. so he brought it in his truck. he's on like his third week. apparently he loves to come to my store. from my perspective he comes in, i give him a sheet of paper, maybe he upstocks a little. i've had almost no interaction with him. but from his perspective i am one of his few non-diva accounts. i'm fun. i spent maybe fifteen or twenty minutes talking to him. there is no way he's over twenty five. he told me about his other accounts. and i said "now that you've made the standards clearer you can expect me to be much higher maintenance in future." he laughed.
but i've hear this stuff before. brittany, the one before the one before him-- she quit back in october, maybe-- she was trained in social work, but when she moved here ended up getting a job for republic. she quit right before the most profitable time of year because they were all just too mean. "not you," she said "you're great, but a lot of them are just really really mean."
and then it was just one beer rep after another.
usually i text em, "anything new?" they tell me, i text em the order. i got in that habit because i didn't have time to deal with em. and the orders weren't all that big. and blah blah.
but they all came in today, and none of them had anything new or impressive to tell me, but it took a lot of time. by the time i was through i was almost two hours late for my lunch.
i was hungry.
i sat down. i started eating my grapefruits and playing with my phone. a few minutes later they are paging me to the wine dept. i am eating my lunch. i do not go. then sergio comes to tell me there is someone in my dept. "i'm eating lunch," i say.
"it's a rep from southern star," he says.
"well, send him back here," i say.
a few minutes later denis comes back to tell me there is someone in my dept.
"it's a gentleman from southern star, and he would just really ,like to meet you."
"well, i'm eating my lunch. he can come back here where i am to meet me, or he can wait ten minutes and i'll come out there to meet him-- his choice."
denis is a new supervisor, and he gave me a look, like it maybe wasn't appropriate to behave in the way i was behaving. but here's the thing. i don't order from them. i don't work for them. these are company reps who at best will tell you what their new products are, or offer to do a tasting for you. at worst they will act like you work for them and start a big debate about how much product you do or do not have, where it is, how old it is, etc. the law says i get an uninterrupted thirty minute lunch. that rarely happens, but i'll be damned if i'm missing my lunch for whoever this guy turns out to be.
he doesn't come back. when i go out, in exactly ten minutes, he's long gone.
so i'm working on stuff. and i go to the front of the store, i can't remember why., but no sooner do i get there than i hear this voice, "excuse me, we need help."
it is a blind couple with large labradore service animals. "of course, how can i help you? is there something i can help you find?"
"i want to buy a candle for my mother."
i took him to candles, picked out scents close to what he was describing for him to smell. that was pretty easy. then he wanted a "plate" for the candle. luckily we only had two.
"this one," i handed it to him "is a small mosaic of mirror, does that make sense?"
"yes i remember mosaic, i know what that means."
"it is only a little bigger than the candle base, but there is enough room to catch drips, if there are any, but this type of candle tends not to drip. it is $2.99. this one," i again hand it to him, "is bigger, it has a coppery finish with a green patina, it has a design etched into it, it looks kind of aztec. it's $6.99. it's pretty. the other one is pretty too; it's simpler."
he chose the lavender candle and mirrored mosaic "plate"
"ok. what else can i help you find?"
"last time i was here, you had some paperweights with animals in them."
"oooo i'm not sure if we still have those. let me find out."
i go ask michelle, who just came back from mardi gras and seems like she had a good time, if she knows anything about paperweights. she takes me to a stack of five. all of them are scotty dogs.
"we have this one kind left," i tell him "they are all scotty dogs."
"oh, i wanted a labrador."
then, we look at bells. lunch bags. the entire contents of the home office dept. this is where i found more paperweights, including one with a labrador puppy which was half price.
we did a sketchy run through the gourmet dept. looked for soda made with cane sugar. ended up with coconut water.
we looked at all the toys.
we looked at tea kettles.
we looked at bath accessories.
we finished up with more candles.
