A bright spot today: I work a truly awful job at a juice bar (I hate people who come up and try to convince me to, say, drink things with raw eggs in them, and vegetable juice has vitamins and shit but I POINT BLANK REFUSE to tell people blatant lies about magnetized water et al), but today. Oh god. Today I had my FAVORITE CUSTOMER EVER, oh my god I want him to be a regular, he was amazing, I want to be him when I grow up.
So it’s me and @twistedangelsays killing time and pretending like we aren’t slowly building up the Leaning Tower of Dishware next to the wash sink when an older gentleman in a very fine hat (elderly but spry, you know the type) walks in with his wife and granddaughter. He strides up to the counter, and we give our usual creepily-peppy greeting and brace ourselves for another crazy in a long line (someone earlier informed us that she does wheatgrass enemas, and…I just really didn’t want to know that, okay?).
“So,” he says, leaning on the counter and observing us with the kind of wry nothing-is-funny-but-if-I-show-fear-the-bad-guys-win smile I’ve been seeing a lot lately. I decide I maybe like this guy enough to drop the creepy pep. He looks us dead in the eye and says, “What juice do you have to get me through the next four years.”
And of course I’m me, so I laugh a little and go, “Trust me, if we had something I’d be hooked up to an IV of it right now.” I am not a professional soul.
He nods very solemnly and sighs and goes, “Well, all right, then what do you have that will give me the strength to fight?”
Adler and I just stand there in this state of delighted awe for a moment before she manages to recommend a juice. We start making his juice and he asks if we’re “a pair” and we tell him that no, we’re not a couple, everyone asks, don’t feel bad, we’re just best friends. And he kind of humphs and nods and goes “Well, that’s still a pair,” and tells us about his best friend of sixty years who he texts every day after meeting in college (meaning that ABSOLUTE MINIMUM this guy is 78).
So we hand him his juice, he takes it, and without further ado tells us the time, date, and location of a protest in our town. And he and his lovely wife swan right on out with their adorable granddaughter with her froyo, and he tells us he’ll see us at the protest.
I feel like I’ve been visited by the Angel of Revolution, I want to be that guy when I’m 78.
