Come for the bug lotion, stay for the flattery

I enlisted a nice gentleman’s help in Rite Aid last night, as I was completely unable to navigate my way toward the bugspray aisle. “Do you have bug-repellent lotions?” I asked him. He thought for a beat and then said, “Let’s go see.” He led me back to the bugspray and I scanned the bottles and canisters and moist towelettes for something more spreadable. I didn’t find what I was looking for.

The man picked up a bottle of silky smooth spray with a supposedly great scent.

“What about something like this?” he asked, showing it to me.

“Nah,” I said. “I’ve got to have full coverage.” He was puzzled and I explained that if any portion of my flesh is exposed when I go outside from spring to the dead of winter, I am guaranteed multiple mosquito bites. Sprays are not going to cut it for me.

“I can be the only one in a group of thirty people who will get bitten,” I said, perversely proud of my freakishness but also disgusted by my body’s inability to fend off tiny bloodsucking critters.

“Ahhhh, you know what they say, don’t you?” he grinned. “That means you’ve got sweet meat.”

I laughed it off, thought better of saying, “I’ve been told that before!”, thanked him, and we parted ways.

Until, that is, I was ready to check out. “I can get you over here,” the man said.

I unloaded my paper towels and bottles of ibuprofen onto the counter.

“Ms. SM, that’s what I’ll call you!” the man said, grinning something fierce.

I smiled back, puzzled.

“Miss Sweet Meat!” he explained, laughing and launching into a conversation as I tried to keep up with him while rummaging for my wallet and the correct chunk of bank-approved plastic required for our transaction.

“It’s not the worst thing I’ve ever been called,” I said.

“Are you from around here?” he asked. “From Memphis?” I nodded. “You a student? Just finishing up the semester?”

Now that was being too kind to me. I see this face in the mirror every day and watch as new lines are carved into its landscape and I do not look like a student much these days. Except maybe for how I dress. “Noooo, no no. But thanks for saying that.”

I told him I’d been out of school for several years and he wanted to know where I worked.

“The paper,” I said. I am always reluctant to tell people exactly where I work because I’m afraid they will clam up and not talk to me or be as free with their words. Everyone likes to imagine that they have something a soulless gotcha journalist would love to snatch and run with. Most everyone has nothing of the sort.

The gentleman lit up and leaned in. “So let me ask you this: What did you think of the paper putting a dead body on the front page?”

“That was my page!” I said.

The man fell out and couldn’t believe it. “That was YOURS?! You’re a local celebrity! I can’t believe it!”

But he thought I meant I took the photo. No, I explained. I just placed the photo and put words around it and tried to make it look good and easy to digest. I expounded on why I thought that photograph was worth putting on the front page of the newspaper. I explained that we purposefully made sure the dead body was below the fold when the paper was in the news rack, since we knew it was sensitive material and we weren’t trying to maximize the shock value just for kicks.

The gentleman told me he was from D.C. and was surprised to see something like that in the Memphis paper. I told him I was surprised by it too.

And then he asked me if I was married, and when I said no, said he really would like to take me out to dinner.

I declined, clumsily (the same way I weaseled out of admitting to being single the last time I talked relationships with the Rite Aid clerk; I know, I have just got to learn to say “thank you, but no”). And he called me “a breath of fresh air” and said he had really enjoyed talking with me.

And it was genuinely the nicest thing that happened to me all day yesterday.