Today Was Not Easy

So. Another long day at work. Though, granted, it was a little different than usual. Most long days are, well, what you'd expect. Lots of contrast between that which one must uphold and the demands being made on oneself, wearying people, the slow drudgery of a bleak season. You know, the typical Saturday. Big sale, too, so extra fun there.

After seven and a half hours of this (well, seven, not counting lunch which was its own lovely situation that we will not be discussing aside from the note that nothing today was simple even including the procurement and comsumption of foodstuffs) I was more than a little elated to have my break happen.

Break is great. I get to go for a walk.

Most might argue that seeing how big a circuit one can walk on a measly fifteen minutes isn't much of a break. But I find wind soothing, quiet (or at least as quiet as a small city / large town gets) relaxing, walking enjoyable, and all that. Plus, if I am out on a hike - however short - no one can find me. It is very hard for coworkers to interrupt your break if you are a block and a half blocks away. So I walk somewhere - in this case a little distance down main street.

In this I get to learn that it is a fun day not just at work. I see no fewer than three emergency vehicles. One is passing down the road (ambulance) in quite a hurry, while a police car and a fire truck have blocked off a road I wander past. Why, precisely, I haven't the foggiest, but it added just a bit of surreality to my trip. Not so much though, as when I was heading back. About a third of the way back into the shopping center where my place of employment resides, I come up on a 7-Eleven. There is a bunch of cars oddly parked at the corner of the little conveince store. One was a van, to the left of all the parking spaces, and on that little triangle of white lines that everyone knows means no parking. Next to that a little sedan - four door, but while I think it was silver god if I can tell for sure. I see one loud, belligerent man coming from the silver sedan shouting at another, who seems to be in the last available parking space that neither of the other two vehicles quite got into. The man from the sedan is loud, belligerent, obviously heading into a good rage. Odd, but not (unfortunately) that strange. Then I see him opening his trunk.

I think, honestly, that as angry as he sounds, he is getting ready to help. Maybe his odd parking job, the odd parking of the van or SUV or whatever that big thing is next to him, it means they are in trouble. Maybe he is trying to help and irritated that he has to. Some people are like that. Perhaps he's getting jumper cables or a jack or a spare tire out of his trunk. He's being a good citizen. I think this, and my world, while somewhat hard for the day, is normal.

The loud angry man pulls a rifle out of his trunk. He opens it up, checks to make sure it is loaded, then snaps it closed. I am not close enough to get all his angry shouts - he is loud mostly through emotion, rather than volume. But some words leak in. 'You', 'don't', 'me', 'my', and I think 'place' or 'space'. I may be wrong - I really do not know the answer. But he points that rifle at the man he was harranging. I honestly believe that he is thinking of killing him. Over what, lacking any other ideas in my head, is a parking space.

I wish I could say I did something brave and stupid at this point. I didn't.

I walked past, not speeding up or slowing down, and once past a couple cars cut in, went directly into the 7-Eleven and told the guy behind the counter, "You have a gentleman threatening another man with a rifle in your parking lot." I got no reply. I think they thought I was joking. I do that, sometimes, and they know me and I know them. I had to repeat it a second time, seriously, and I did. I was calm. I did not break into any kind of hysterics. I am proud of that much of my conduct at least. The second repetition did it, too. Both the clerk at the register and the other clerk in the store paid attention. The second clerk walked up to the front and we looked over, but the second car misparked, the SUV or van or whatever it was, it blocks any view. But it looks like maybe the sedan is gone. We haven't heard any gunshots.

It has been less than a minute, but it is probably over. The clerk beside me, senior to the fellow behind the counter, goes with the basic thought that it didn't happen in his store, he saw none of it, and it seemed to have blown over - not his problem. For all he knows, I am making it up. I have no idea. Thinking about it from his perspective, I might have done the same thing he then did: Figured it wasn't my problem, since I didn't see anything. He said as much, then he went back to his job. Life inside the 7-Eleven proceded on course. For all they knew, nothing had happened.

I went back out. The angry man had left, his sedan with him. The gentleman he was threatening moments before already had the police on his cell phone, and with the aid of another witness and myself, gave what information he could. Especially since, apparently, when the sedan left, the rifle was 'riding shotgun', as it were, and anyone on such a hair trigger might use it elsewhere. I couldn't provide much - I saw bits and pieces, but I was at a distance for most of the unfolding events.

And it was so fast.

I added what I could, which wasn't enough. I made sure the gentleman who, again, near as I can tell took a parking space someone else wanted and was threatened seriously with being shot had my name and place of employment in case he needed a witness. Because, if all you are going to do is make a point, why grab a gun? And if you just mean to scare the guy, why be sure it's loaded? Then I went back to work, shaken and doing my best not to be. I finished out the day with only a few more of the piddling little difficulties that make my current vocation such a trial, though they dragged more for the wonderful extra stress I picked up over break.

It was a hard day. Worst of all is the memory that I walked past. What I saw could just have easily been a homocide. I walked past. I honestly can't see anything better I could have done. Trying to break up a dispute where one guy goes from irritation to branishing deadly weapons is the height of stupidity, and I could have made things so much worse. I could have been the last straw before shooting started. I was prudent instead. I went directly to a place where there was possible aid. I did the safe thing, I think. I did the wise thing, I think.

I think.

Yet I keep wondering about the sequence of events. What if the argument hadn't gone so well? If it had been worse. If that angry man with the rifle had pulled the trigger, while I was doing the safe, wise thing, how would I feel about myself now? I saw a man pull a fucking gun longer than my arm, and I walked past. Not a word, not a whisper. I tell myself I did right. I even believe it. I still feel like a coward.

How would I have slept tonight, if he'd fired after I walked past? Would I have?