Tales of retail madness

When I was at work the other day, maybe it was last weekend. We had a mother bring her obese daughter in to get her clothing for school. She also had a son, maybe 3 or so. At first they just seemed like normal shoppers. I kind of felt bad for the little girl at first because well, she looked as if she might have been 12 years old and shopping in a plus sized womens store. That had to be embarrassing. I know if I were that heavy at that age I don't think my self esteem would have all been that high.

So, over the span of an hour or so I watched the little boy run around and act like a little terror, not listening to his mother and just acting out. I am sure it is normal behavior for a coddled 3 year old. At some point it really started to annoy me so I kept giving him the evil stare of death. The same stare that our children will receive when we have them Mik. Anyway, this girl is trying on clothes and her mother is softly speaking with her as another of my fellow associates is attending to them. I couldn't make out what they were saying back and forth but I could tell the girl was being a brat and it seemed as if she were getting more and more annoyed with her mom.

After she was finished trying clothing on the mother took her unfolded piles of clothes up the register and told the young girl to keep an eye on her little brother. Well, that's when all hell broke loose. First the boy wouldn't listen to her, but she was acting so horrid to the little boy it was a wonder why he didn't. He was running around like a maniac and she was huffing and puffing away whining at him to get back in his stroller. Meanwhile the mother in a sing songy voice said "No gumball for you young man, hee hee."

I was standing there folding some shirts and the little boy runs past me and dives on the floor. The girl trudges up and says in the most disturbing voice i've heard from a little girl of 12 and says, "GET YOUR FUCKING ASS UP OFF THE FLOOR". I stood there with my mouth hanging open and was tempted to tell her we didn't use that kind of language in the store. But then I reconsidered, these were not my children and I would probably not see either one of them again (thank God).

For some reason this really disturbed me.

After they had left my fellow associate came up to me and said "Are you ready to hear the story about them?". I said sure and listened because I was curious. She told me they had come in really late last year at 9:20 which is practically closing time for us. But the mother was standing there crying at the gate. She had said that the little girl didn't like coming out to shop during the day so this was the only time she could get her out to go school shopping for her. So, my associate and the manager had felt sympathetic towards her. Naturally they let the family in to shop. Well as the story goes, the girl was more horrid last year, she was yelling and screaming at her mother and grandmother, screaming that it was their fault she was fat and they were going to pay for it for the rest of their lives. My associate friend said at one point she found the grandmother and mother on the floor of the dressing room crying.

In my mind I could totally see this demon of a child saying something of that sort. Obviously she isn't stable enough to realize that she is pretty well in control of her own destiny and blames it souly on the mother and grandmother. I mean, I don't know the whole situation and I really don't have any room to pass judgment. I can only go on what my experiences are in life. But to me that was quite disturbing. It makes me think of that book 1984 when the children were controlling their parents through the fear of being turned into the thought police.

All in all I hope the girl at some point gets a hold of herself and stops blaming everyone else around her and take some sort of account for her own life.

Also I think that was the same night my manager got hit on by a lesbian. That was also quite disturbing.