“Onward! Let’s let go of the past and buy a new trimmer!” he said, like an idiot.
No staff in sight in the confusing ordeal of a labyrinth that is Home Depot. I finally find the trimmers. Lots of options. Too many. The vast selection of this array is dizzying and it looks like they don’t have the refill cartridges I might need.
I talk to another customer who has been on the hunt for a trimmer longer than me. It’s a big debate for him, too. Still no staff to answer two questions (because I really don’t want to buy another shitty trimmer.) Patience starts to fade and we’re losing daylight. The shadows are growing long and deep as tumbleweeds tumble past the Halloween witch display.
Big breath. The customer who abandoned his quest for a trimmer wanders by again, shaking his head with pity. He’ll go home and see his family tonight. Me? I’m determined. Stupid, stupid and determined.
Back to the same desk with the same woman behind the counter. She and another staffer are helping the guy in front of me. By that I mean the other staffer is talking to the guy and she’s watching, kind of like how cows chew the cud while gazing at passing traffic.
I finally catch her eye by jumping up and down. Same polite request for assistance with the goddamn trimmer. I have money. Please help me give it to you! But I don’t say anything mean because…I’m not sure now. I’m kind to waiters and waitresses because I like spit-free food. At Home Depot, I suppose the worst they can do to me is what they’re already doing.
What infuriates me most is that the cud chewer takes my second request like she’s never seen me before. In fairness, eons have passed since my first request for help. Am I in hardware hell? In which circle of Dante’s Inferno does a sinner turn invisible? Oh, right. The lawn trimmer circle.
I stalk back to the trimmer section. Last week at the mall I thought everyone was staring at me. (I suspect it’s the chain wallet. They’re staring at my chain wallet, right?) But at Home Depot, I can’t get arrested. As I await some helpful staff member in pumpkin orange, I start to think about what I could do at Home Depot to get arrested. The chain saws are, like, right over there, man.
Anyway, no staff even wander by for me to flag down. No one answers the second call from the desk. I consider cutting myself with a snowblower blade but if I change my mind mid-suicide, there surely won’t be any help on the way for jets of hot pumping blood, either.
I look around. Other customers are wandering around, guileless of what I am about to unleash on this store. Rending my clothes, certainly. Tantrums and tears. Vitriol and shouting that sends innocent families scurrying for the exits. Authorities will be called. But they won’t find me. I’m the invisible man in the lawn trimming section of Home Depot. If you ever want to disappear, this is place is the shit.