An urban vignette
After I parked my old green minivan at the Greenwood Fred Meyer store about 21:50, a young couple with a pit bull bounded down the entry steps mad as Hell. They were yelling & arguing over whether or not their dog had taken a big poop. Made me forget for a wee bit why I drove all the way there after work to buy food & toiletries. Did the dog take a big doggie dump inside the grocery store? Next to all the food? Or not? Well, dayum!
People are something else. Humans are a mess. Life is messy, and people will choose to do what people do when they remain unaware they have choices. And Big Dawg in the parking lot? Big Dawg clearly didn’t give a shit and wasn’t about to shit for the asshole yanking back on its leash as they both bounded down the concrete steps from the store into the parking lot ahead of the woman yobbling out behind them. Dayum! Oh, shit, are these too many damns and shits for thee? Read on, thy fair readers. Tis merely a vignette!
Man: The man was agitated, expansive, with arms flung wide and head thrown back with red cap yanked down tight over cropped, black hair. He was a man of color, muscular & compact, and looked like a rugby rumbler. He talked loudly & gestured animatedly. He ran, in part to keep up with his dawg.
Dog: Big bold beast dawg. A whitish, tanny brown pit bull who leapt ahead like a wild ass race horse. At least I think the dog was a pit bull. Yanked on the leash, too, doggie did. Stood up on two hind legs until the man dashed up, then the pit bull lunged ahead again and jerked the man about just a twitch as he played out more slack while hollerin’ back at the woman scooting along after him.
Woman: She, the young woman, was white, blonde, skinny, & hunched over & clenched up. He moved with wide, bowlegged, wide kung fu horsie stance posturing like a tough guy as if the leash he gripped in his right hand was a battle axe. She, however, held everything close to her like a female praying mantis, fearful, defensive, hyper alert…because she hadn’t yet taken off his head to gnaw upon his face as female praying mantises usually do. Oh, gross!
Yeah, he could beat her up, I guess, Mr. Showoff with one hand wide open to rile up the air in the whole parking lot. Her arms, folded in her black rain jacket, looked like they could unlock, pop open, decapitate him, then fold back inwards mighty superquick like. She spoke in fast, rapid fire mumble bursts as if she not only was gonna chomp off the man’s head at the neck, which required a rather enormous bilateral temporomandibular joint system, but bite it raw.
“Goddamn it, I’m telling ya, our dawg ain’t shit in two days!” he yelled loud as Hell for the whole world to hear. “Yeah, ain’t shit none in two whole goddamn days, I say!”
“Yes, he did shit, too, goddammit, yes he did! He sure did shit some because I saw him shit! Was one big ass shit, too, dammit, so yeah, Hell yeah, he done shit! Took a big ol’ dump, yes he did, too! Stinky ass dog shit, too!” She jabbered like 32 kilometers a second.
“No he ain’t! No he ain’t shit! I’m telling ya! Lookit! Dawg can’t even walk right being so packed tight fulla shit! Dawg ain’t shit none a’TALL for TWO WHOLE GODDAMN DAYS!!! I’m telling ya, I say! Dawg ain’t right.”
“Was constipated, stoopid!” she yammered back at him quick & pissy. “Constipation’s all it is!”
Constipation! For some silly reason the lyrics of The Rolling Stones song, “Can’t Get No Satisfaction” began to unravel my mind. What a foolish notion! All because the last syllable rhymes somewhat with, “ocean.”
They zoomed across the parking lot with all eight legs churning. I’m hard-of-hearing and wear hearing aids, but, damn, their mouths were working hard, working real hard, yes they were, and ol’ Big Dog, male or female or bothever didn’t make a sound, not even a bark or whimper or a growl, not any I could hear.
As I chuckled and trotted on up the steps to go grocery shopping before Fred Meyer closed, a security guard, a black man in a pointed beard wearing a uniform that ironically reminded me of what people wore in futuristic sy-fy space opera movies from 21st Century Communist China, came strolling out looking seriously hairy-eyed at them. I shook my head, chuckled again, and went on inside to peruse the food.
So I wondered how the rest of the night went for the couple fighting over whether or not their poor doggie took a big diggity doggy dump. Were they posturing a bit? Putting on a show for the rest of us out in the store because they enjoyed all the attention of everyone else scowling at them or looking perplexed, judgmental, or otherwise befuddled? Well, dayum!
William Dudley Bass
Monday 16 September 2019
Saturday 21 September 20219
Seattle, Washington
USA
Cascadia
Sol
Copyright © 2019 by William Dudley Bass. All Rights Reserved by the Author & his Descendants until we Humans establish Wise Stewardship over and for our Earth and Solarian Commons. Thank you.