| Feb. 25th, 2007 @ 04:06 pm The end of an era, the beginning of a similar era |
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Yesterday was my last day at Borders in King of Prussia; tomorrow I start in Bryn Mawr. It was a miserably long last day. Saturday closing shifts are no picnic, and it didn't help that I'm nursing a brand new cold -- one that starting just days after I finally regained my voice, which I completely lost for about a week. To tell you the truth, I'd rather be sick than lose my voice like that. It's incredibly frustrating to lose your ability to communicate verbally, especially when you're as chatty as I am.
However, Debbie made me the most delicious cake I've ever experienced -- strawberry cake with actual strawberries on top and the words, "Good luck, Melissa" written on top in icing. I had to sneak a piece home to Rosalie, it was such a popular cake. And there was a goodbye card passed around, where many people wrote some really funny things. BJ (my brother, who works in the cafe), for instance, wrote "You're like a sister to me" and Travis wrote "Your memory will live on." I'm honestly not sure what he meant by that.
But the biggest surprise of all was left in my mailbox. It was a mix CD made by Matt, my work nemesis. The title: "a posthumous peace offering by Matt." He's really not one for capitalization. I was pretty touched to find this. Matt is this skinny kid, about my age, with dyed-black Edward Scissorhands-style hair. We got off on the wrong foot way back when he started at Borders, when I jokingly made fun of his Bright Eyes t-shirt. I later apologized, explaining that really I had no right to make fun of him. I've seen Bright Eyes, like, 3 times or something (it's a long story). I even own two of his CD's. I told him that I have difficulty listening to Bright Eyes because it's so dramatic, and it makes me feel embarrassed and adolescent whenever I hear it. However, I can see that Conor Oberst is on my side politically, I completely support him as a star for all the youngsters out there. I would love it if he became the most famous music idol on earth because he seems to have integrity and I feel he'd be a much better role model than most other popular musicians, even if I personally find it difficult to listen to most of his music without cringing (I actually like that "Lover I Don't Have to Love" song and "I Will Be Grateful For This Day").
Anyway, no amount of explanation could make up for our initial bad beginning. He was continually nasty to me after that. Of course, that's not saying much because he's kind of a nasty fellow. Or, maybe not nasty, but definitely sarcastic. He's sarcastic to everyone, always, or at least he sounds like he's being sarcastic. Customers complained about him all the time, and I could really see why. But it seemed like he reserved a particular mocking for me. So I thought on it for a while, and I came up with the ideal response for whenever he was acting nasty toward me: I would say, in a really over the top, smiley way, "Matt, do you have a CRUSH on me?" That was pretty effective, and he was less nasty to me for a while.
So then I decided that it didn't make sense that we weren't buds, especially considering how friendly I was with the rest of the Borders staff. I mean, here was this kid who wore Kill Rock Stars and Bikini Kill t-shirts and read Bitch Magazine ("A feminist!" I thought, "We should be friends!"). And he was pure sneer, which I can at least mostly respect. So I started to talk music with him a bit. Turned out he likes Neutral Milk Hotel but didn't have any of the amazing non-album songs. I offered to make him a CD of them, which he scoffed at in a pretty patronizing manner. Then one time we were talking about Elliott Smith, and I said something about his George Harrison-esque guitar, and he again scoffed most dramatically and insisted that nothing about Elliott Smith and George Harrison sounded very alike at all. Which is, of course, patently absurd. But the thing about Matt is that, for a feminist, he wasn't a very good listener. He interrupted a lot, and once you made any claim that he initially disagreed with, he would never listen to any of your arguments that followed supporting that claim. And the last musical straw between us came when I suggested he listen to early Liz Phair. This was treated by him as the most ridiculous suggestion he ever heard, all because he was familiar with her terrible song "Why Can't I." It was no use trying to explain to him that Liz Phair used to be totally different -- he'd hear NONE of that. But I'm sure that if he's as much of a feminist as he claims to be, Exile in Guyville would be a welcome musical addition to his life if he'd give it a chance.
I quickly gave up on any attempt to be his buddy. It was just not going to happen. But then I became the kiosk lead and he became a kiosk worker. So I was, like, in charge of him. He didn't like that one bit. I'm not a very tough supervisor. There were really just three rules at the kiosk: keep stuff in order, don't read, and don't sit. I let people read anyway, and I often read myself. However, I always kept everything in order, and I didn't read when we were busy and instead kept an eye on the customers. And there was no chair, so there was no sitting. Well, Matt would go get a chair from the neighboring kiosk and he'd read all day, and he'd keep nothing in order. On top of that, he'd be rude to customers. One time, I saw a woman ask him where the cat calendars were and he said, really sarcastically, "Yeah... They're right behind you." Plus, he'd throw away the notes I'd leave for the whole staff, and I'm pretty sure he lied about me to the girl working at the neighboring kiosk, causing her to want to beat me up.
This one day, I came down to the kiosk on a Saturday afternoon when he was working. It was really busy, everything was a mess, and he was sitting at a chair reading. So I said to him, "Hey Matt, how about if, instead of reading, you kept stuff in order." His response: "You know, I've never seen anyone with so little authority so drunk on power." I didn't say anything to that, and instead collected his book and magazine (Susan Faludi's Backlash and Bitch Magazine) to bring upstairs. Then he said, "This is why everyone at the kiosk hates you! And everyone at the neighboring kiosks hate you too!" and I was like, "Oh no! Who's going to ask me to the prom now?" and I left. He ended up getting written up for this incident.
We didn't really talk after that. But on the last day of the kiosk's existence, when we were closing it down, he was looking annoyed waiting for me to let him leave and a Bright Eyes song came on the overhead music playing in the mall. Then he looked really disgusted and betrayed. I laughed and told him to go.
And now I get this CD from him. A posthumous peace offering, he says. And I really was touched -- although when I think about it a bit more, I feel slightly patronized by his assumption that I'd want to hear what he likes after he was so resistant to any of my suggestions or offers to give him some tunes. And the music is fairly obvious -- some things I've listened to for years (Sebadoh, Mirah, Pavement), some things you couldn't pay me to listen to (Onelinedrawing, Pedro the Lion), one painfully MP3-sourced track ("Tuff Ghost" by The Unicorns), and only two things I've never heard or heard of (Devics, Young Marble Giants). However, I will try not to look a gift horse in the mouth, and overall, it's an ok mix. I'll try to take it as a peace offering and feel touched and feel like the one person who really disliked me at Borders maybe doesn't dislike me so much. And I'll remember Borders at King of Prussia fondly. |
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