I make my living in retail.   Being a retail worker, I like to compare myself to immortal gods of ancient history.  Why not?

Like any retail worker, or Supreme Being, I am both revered, and despised.  When my attention is needed, circumstances have obviously become dire and out of control for the supplicants. Human pride forces them to become sullen, and take on a “You’re not the boss of me!” attitude.  Despite their disdain, I know they truly require help and guidance.

Reverence, unfortunately, is often overlooked as the petitioner hurries off, solution in hand.  A god of old would have blasted the ungrateful seeker in the butt with a couple of well-placed lighting bolts.  Unfortunately, times have changed, and the threat of litigation makes that impossible.  Our modern day credo is to provide those we serve with a “Happy Howdy Doody Day”.  Anything less could result in my banishment from the nether world, and I like having a job. 

Much of the time, I am a ghost, invisible and unseen by the human eye.  Sometimes, however, when the need arises and the pull of the material world is strong enough, I manifest into a corporeal being.

“DO YOU WORK HERE?” demands the Summoner.  Apparently, my name-tag, and the T-Shirt emblazoned with the name of my grocery store are not proof enough.   Before I can reply, two identical bananas are thrust under my nose.  “Which one of these is organic?” queries He Who Dragged Me Into This World.

Ho ho!  I am now an Oracle!

I take the bananas in my hands, briefly close me eyes, and run my fingers over the waxy skin.  Ah, there it is; the little sticker that reads “Organic.”  I make no judgment of the Summoner’s intelligence though the story might provide a chuckle back at the Supreme Being break room.

Handing back the more expensive banana, I intone, “No animals were injured in the making of this fruit.”   The banana is yanked from my grasp, and without a fare-thee-well, the pesticide-free individual moves on. Calm and accepting, I invoke my mantra, “Thy Will is Mine. ”

I’ve come to learn a great deal about the people who shop in my pretentious, politically correct (range-free, sugar-free, gluten-free and sodium-free), holier-than-thou boutique food emporium.  In their eyes, I am little more than an uneducated female, without prospects, obviously career disabled, a likely illegal alien, and possible felon.  I am less than human, and unworthy of their consideration.  I exist merely to assist them in acquirring earth-friendly sustenance.

My Supreme Sensei assures me that they are actually well-intentioned folk who would rather plow into a tree than run over a squirrel.  This is a Blue state.  Most voted for Obama, or at least say they did.  Large checks are sent to various charities, and they walk with purpose through Central Park to support The Fight against Breast Cancer, MS, Autism, Botox Abuse, and Multiple Births to Mothers who Can’t Afford The Extra Children.  Twice a year they dutifully drop last season’s casts-offs into the Goodwill bins next to Starbucks.  By most standards, these people would be judged good people, and most of the time they are.  

Yet I have seen The Inner Beast. 

It was a Saturday afternoon, and the reading on the store’s “Shopper Insanity” barometer had already reached "Frantic".

I was kneeling on the floor of the produce section, re-stocking the baby carrots when a sharp pain in my foot made me realize I had been run over by a cart.  The beautiful, young female cart wielder wearing skin-tight Under Armour work out clothing seemed unaware that she had struck me.  Taking it to be a mere accident, I went back to my task; the demand for baby carrots cannot be underestimated! 

Then she hit me again.  I looked up into a pair of dead, black eyes. I was in her way and by God, this implacable shopping shark needed to continue to move forward, or like most sharks, she would die.

It was her husband, with their new born man-eater swaddled in the snuggly on his chest, who finally spoke up, “Uhhh…Hon?  I think you’ve hit the grocery girl.” 

I, Grocery Girl, nodded and gaily responded. "Twice!” Producing my best Happy Howdy Doody grin, I offered, “If you’ll just back up off my foot, I will gladly get out of your way!”  

The She Shark sniffed.  I’ve read about the disdainful sniff in Henry James’ novels but had never experienced one in real life.  It physically hurt!

Rather than simply backing up and going around me, she “udged” her shopping cart in that terribly awkward maneuver where one hops a cart sideways, a direction it was not designed to go.  She meant to drive home the fact that my mere presence had deeply inconvenienced her. Hubby, the Cleaner Fish, smiled sheepishly, and followed in her Great White wake.  

I did not chase her down and beat her with the femur of a goat, though it is among my rights as a minor divine being.  I wanted to with all my heart.  Sadly, it is not the Happy Howdy Doody Way.

Verbal abuse is a daily fact of a retail deity’s life.  Most of it is just silly.  “Well…You…Right Then!  What’s the number to your Corporate Office?” The Millet Rant, however, transcended any previous mistreatment I’d yet encountered, in both vociferousness and hallucinogenic quality.

Conjured into being by a seemingly innocuous, sweet-faced elderly woman, I found myself utterly flummoxed when she asked, “Where might I find the millet?”

“Millet?” I repeated stupidly. 

I am now aware that plenty of people know what millet is, but I performed an unofficial poll and the answers I received ranged from “a fixative that is mixed into a concrete compound”, to “the material that is stuffed inside League-approved Cricket balls”.  Lots of damned people don’t know what millet is, even Supreme Beings!  It’s a GRAIN, okay?   A freaking grain, I got it now!   Oooooh, I hate not all-knowing everything!

Call me epicurically challenged, but my face gave me away. Granny Good Grain went instantly, irrationally, ballistic. 

“How can this establishment even consider hiring a worker who has no knowledge of basic grains?” Actually, that wasn’t a bad question.  “And how was it possible for you to get as old as you are without knowing what Millet is?” Actually, an even better question.  “Leave!”  She cried tremulously, pointing towards the front door.  “Leave this store at once!” 

Stillness had descended during her tirade.  Witnessing a diminutive, pissed-off senior citizen order a worker from her workplace will stop traffic.

As I stood there, lips flapping like a landed fish, my manager arrived.  Apparently the aggrieved consumer’s piercing tones had reached the storefront and cracked some glass. 

“What have you done?” he asked me furiously. (Eternal Question: Do managers ever back up their employees?  All-Knowing One’s Reply: Eternally, no.)

“MILLET!”  The Cracked-Oat-Addict Senior shrieked.

His face smoothed out, and he shrugged, “Oh.  Yeah.  We don’t carry millet.”

I was in the parking lot by the end of that sentence.  My eardrums, and psyche, had taken enough.   I know they gave her a gift card and a free cab ride home, but I’m glad I wasn’t there to see it.  I was horrified, humiliated, and my feet hurt.

Happily, there were witnesses to assure my manager that I had not applied burning implements to elicit such horrifying sounds, and that I hadn’t had much opportunity to be disrespectful.  Utterly humbled, my only answer to my manager’s questions was, “Millet was NOT on the application.” 

It is so very difficult to be divine in retail.