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A friend needed to get some new running shoes.  We browsed the usual places, looking, trying things on.  Nothing seemed just right.  It was like Goldilocks and the Three Bears-- tasting of the porridge had to be done and this one was not the right color, that one was not the right size in the right color, and then not the favored brand and too rubbery or too plastic.  Nothing was hot, everything was blah too cold, worth a dime but not a hundred plus dollars.

  Sneakers are not the most beautiful things in the world unless you are lusting after a certain color or style or breathable pair.  Down right ugly, some of them.  They remind me of some cars on the road, as if the designers making plastic bumpers for trucks are secretly shrinking those down to replicate rubbery plastic fenders for the good old sneaker.  

After a go at it, me not able to get into my friend's head, to read the fantasy of what perfect sneakers might look like, (excuse me, running shoes) I sort of hung back and let him do his little mosaic walk through stores.  No good. Thousands of pairs later, we went to Dick's Sporting Goods. 

This is not a plug for Dicks, I don't love Dick's I don't hate Dick's. In fact, I have never seen Dick in Dick's nor anyone named Dick standing inside it, to greet me or take my money.  Dicks was finally the only place open with sneakers we had yet to gaze at, looking for the one that like a golden slipper in Cinderella's early fantasy would make the prince re-appear... the prince in this situation would be the words, ah, YES, I love this pair.  I will take it home, adore it, use it and abuse it lovingly.

In the parking lot, we lingered in the car listening to the end of a football game.  It was a beautiful day.  In the row of cars in front of us, a hummer gleamed next to some other sun bouncing vehicles.  Then a door opened and a man stepped out with an energy I did not have left at this point in the day.  He stood up, reached in the back of his vehicle and pulled out a Rifle.  I had watched the Rifleman as a kid and knew when a man used a rifle with confidence.  This man carried that power scoped tool with attitude, know how, an I am on a mission do not cross my path you lingering window shoppers you.  I hadn't seen that much confidence on display at all the sneaker stores we'd visited all afternoon. 

We watched in slow motion as the guy and his Rifle went inside Dick's.  We stared.  We looked at each other.  I have never seen a man with a rifle in a suburban parking lot in all my life.  I was thinking the way he brandished it in the parking lot, no bag, no tag, no self-awareness of others, spelled N U T S.   

I know... but....
He's probably returning it, he said.

It only takes a few seconds to imagine this. A world of walking hate.  Insanity.

We looked at each other.  We grinned. The Patriots game was coming on.  We had a schedule to keep.  He'd already opened the door. Let's go in, he said.  He laughed, Come on! I shook my head, acted like I was being silly. 

We got out of my car, entered the rifleman's footsteps.  We were not packing. I actually felt naked thinking this. I hate guns.  I pressed the auto button on my key ring to lock the interior of my vehicle.  The car alarm made its warning sound.  I thought, I could just as well be taking this instant to press the trigger on a gun.  It's a similar gesture.  People do that, they aim their auto key lock at their trucks and make a little flick of the wrist like shooting a gun while they press the lock, they do something with their shoulders too, a little two step happy dance.  Vehicles beep back at us, blow horns, the sound gives satisfaction.  It says, you are safe, your stuff is safe.  I locked up a dead space in my car and took my life (my valuable) and followed my friend's life across the hot asphalt.   

We went inside. The light's were bright, almost garish.  The a/c loudish, blowing full speed ahead.