Transient Inspiration

Walking upstairs to the main level at the Sugarhouse D.I. I am confronted by a confrontation. A street person has somehow invoked the ire of store management (no doubt starting with a run in with a customer, which led to a run in with some type of clerk and escalated). The brouhaha is centrally situated- right by the checkstands, so both cashiers and customers are painstakingly refraining from betraying the fact that they sense anything out of the ordinary. And I'm one of them. I just want to purchase the wonderful novels I've found for under two dollars apiece, so I sidestep the verbal tussle (both parties are shouting at the the top of their voices, but for some reason I can't recall most of their arguments) and make my way to a kindly fifty-something cashier who looks like she could be a secretary in an LDS Seminary - either that or a Young Women's President. She is genuinely friendly and makes small talk as she rings my books up; with loud threats of physical violence and police interaction in the background she maintains her air of genuine friendliness as she inquires about my Christmas. "Fuck"s and "Shit"s ring out continually - as out of place as a Hasid in the midst of the Hajj - but the sense of "normalcy" is somehow maintained. Woodrow Wilson would be proud. By the time the homeless gentleman is hussled out the front door I am only a few steps behind. I pause between the two sets of doors, breathe in the aroma of some cheap unrecognizable vodka, then head south to the State Liquor Store where I buy a pint of Jim Beam.