It was a simple recon mission: run in, get a few things that evening for breakfast the next morning—bagels, cottage cheese, Metamucil (science!)—rush home and watch 30 Rock on TiVo (science!). I made no judgments about you, a 50-ish man working the checkout counter—the thick bristles of salt and pepper hair that started just north of the bridge of your nose; your pursed, dismissive lips; the fact that you wouldn’t make eye contact with me. You rang me up, asked for my money, whereupon I realized I hadn’t used my Vons Club card, depriving myself of a 50 cent savings on a large container of nonfat cottage cheese (science!). But when I tried to swipe the card you exploded. “No! No! No!” you shouted, and began bullying me to leave, shoving change—50 cents short—into my hand. When your boss came over and told you to take care of me the proper way, you started muttering loudly in some foreign language, and not the acceptable ones (Spanish, Asian). It was one of those with the hard consonants and back of the throat gutturations and it suddenly all came together for me: the hair, the absence of human feeling. I remembered the news reports, the international trial, the charges of crimes against humanity for racial cleansing (science!) and there you were. I left shaken, wondering about the horrific memories of actions past that torment you as you ask for a price check on wax beans. Good, I say. Hell takes many forms and payback’s a bitch—50 cents at a time.

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Tags: Columns