The
other day – as has been reported in the media – we had so much rain, after many
super-hot days and so little precipitation, that communities flooded and the
power went out. The causes of this are various and multifarious, stemming from
our current government’s inability to take its eyes off the bottom line and
their cronies’ shifting moods and to spend money on new and effective
infrastructure rather than propping-up the old stuff that, despite becoming
ever more ineffective still manages to line said cronies’ pockets with filthy
lucre. Coupled with the half-arsed rort that is the “new vision” of the
National Broadband Network (NBN), a patchworked and jury-rigged system many
times slower than the service previously provided by individual internet
service providers, nowadays when we lose power, we also lose all internet and
telephone services. Double-whammy – huzzah!
In
days of yore, if the lights went out, we were still able to run EFTPOS sales at
our shop, since the machine we use switches from mains supply to cellular in
emergencies (and allows us to take the device to off-site venues in order to
sell stock). In the current situation, even this option is taken from us. Nice,
guys: can’t wait to see what you do with the economy.
Anyway,
as I say, the other day the heavens opened and the lights went out; not just in
our shop but all through the mercantile district of our small town. To add
insult to injury, the residential parts of town only a block away were
unaffected. In disgust, my boss threw up his hands and went home, telling me
that, if the power didn’t come on after an hour, I should shut the place down
and go home. I settled in and waited.
You
might wonder what it would take for a person to leave home in a thundering
downpour, drive along unlit roads and highways without any traffic lights, onto
a main street lined with darkened shop windows to check out the local
bookstore. I was pretty sure that my hour-long wait to an early knock-off was going
to be uneventful, but I underestimated the tenacity of the book-buyer. As it
was, during that time I had three customers.
The
first dragged his sorry, mouth-breathing carcase through the shop door only
minutes after the boss made his exit.
‘G’day,’
I said. ‘We have no power or lights so browsing will be a tad difficult.
However, if you know what you want and can pay in cash, I’m happy to help.’
By
way of reply, he winced and nodded his head sharply to indicate comprehension.
Then he zipped off into the midnight-black bowels of the store.
Some
minutes later, another, older, fellow came in, pausing first at the door to ask
if we were indeed open. I told him yes and gave him the spiel outlined above.
‘Great!’
he said. ‘I saw that book about Lego in the window on the weekend and I came
back to see if it was still here. I thought for sure someone else would get it
first!’
Assuring
me that he had the cash, I made change and bagged the book while we bantered
about how much his grandson would enjoy it after seeing the “Lego Movie”. He was out in short order
and I wrote up the details of the sale to be run through the system when the
power returned.
I
had, at this point, almost forgotten the previous punter when suddenly his
voice rang out from the darkness:
‘Hey!
How ‘bout a little light back here?’
I
shook my head. Groping back to where this idiot was lurking, I tried again to
explain the current situation.
‘Mate.’
I said. ‘There’s a blackout happening. No lights. No power. Cash sales only.’
By
way of reply, he winced and shook his head once again, just like before, then
stuck his nose in the bookshelves once more. I shook my head and went back to
closing.
The
third customer also paused at the door wondering if indeed we were open for
business. Assuring her that, yes, we were, but under certain limitations, she
revealed that she was someone for whom we’d tracked down a copy of a particular
book and whom we’d rung that morning to say that it had arrived. She had shown
up as promised and – wonder of wonders! – she could pay in cash. We conducted
our business, exchanged pleasantries, and she was on her way. I went outside to
bring in our store sign prior to locking up and leaving. As I came back in the
following words drifted out from the back of the store:
‘Hey,
it’s really dark. Can I get some light?’
Now,
I didn’t just pop my cork at this juncture, as you might expect. I quickly ran
though in my mind all the elements of the interaction I’d had with this fellow.
He’d seemed to comprehend everything I’d said; he wasn’t wearing hearing aids;
he’d seemed a little dull, but not overly slow. I wasn’t in the mood for
mollycoddling so I fired at him point-blank:
‘Buddy,
what part of “no lights; no power” do you not understand?’
‘Oh,
I get it,’ he said, ‘it’s just that I can’t see the books.’
‘Well,
get this: we’re closed. Bye!’
Look,
I understand: there’s a pleasure to be found in reading and most folks don’t
like their pleasures cut short. There are some readers however who will
staunchly Deny Reality in pursuit of their single-minded goal. In an earlier
post, I displayed that picture of the three guys in the bombed-out bookshop –
people who decide those three are “cool” and cheer them on, are usually the
same people who, like this idiot, will resolutely stand in a pitch-black
bookstore, trying to read books that they can’t see, and call for a light that
isn’t forthcoming. You can bet that I keep a weather-eye on these types and
make sure they don’t ruin my day...
