Getting it

After high school, I decided to major in the thing I was best at.  Something involving language and words.  My first impulse was journalism, so I chose that although I didn't really understand what I was getting into.  I was 18 and didn't know what the hell I was doing in many aspects of life.  After a few months of being told by my professors from the mass communications department how bleak the future of print media is (they predicted the demise of print as if to jinx its arrival) I decided to pursue the writing track in the English program.  The BFA in creative and professional writing.  I had never done any fiction writing in high school; just a lot of reading.  Since my freshman year, I've started to get it.  And in a typically writerly sort of way, I've gotten it on my own.

The biggest thing I've learned is that most fiction springs from reality, at least mine does.  Thinking back on something that I've witnessed and fictionalizing it -- adding a person here, changing an action there, taking myself out of the picture and throwing a character into the fire -- has become a great springboard for me.  If something bizarre happens, I'll be sure to remember it so I can write it.  And that has changed my way of thinking as well.  Over the past few years I have started to write scenes in my head while observing people.  This happens most often at work, which is a great place for it to happen, since I work with the public.  I work at a grocery store in the summer.  Is the following snippet fiction or non-fiction?

***

I noticed the man walk into the store and I knew right away that something about him was off.  He had an unsettled look on his face, as if he could break into loud shrieks at any moment, or burst into flames. Maybe both.  He pulled a cart from one of the four rows that stuffed the cart room and staggered past the produce section.  I watched him from a secluded area near the potatoes.

He continued past the produce -- I didn't have him pinned as a fruit-and-vegetable guy.  No, this man likes his frozen dinners.  His greasy black baseball cap and loose blue Dickies seemed to pull him toward aisle three and the rest of the obese members of this corner of society.  One dollar meals in a microwavable plastic container were this guy's only source of calories.

Near the deli, not 10 feet in front of me, he let out a yell.  A yell that you would expect to hear from the monkeys at the zoo, while you're watching the sleeping lions.  Is this guy for real?  I half expected a camera crew to come through the door, some stoner punks that are still obsessed with Jackass.  But there was no camera crew, and this man didn't seem to want -- or expect -- any fanfare.

After the animalistic yell, his pants fell down.  He had a white knuckle grip on his shopping cart with both hands, whereas one hand should have been holding up his Dickies.  He took a few steps before bending down to pull them up, re-concealing his yellow briefs that had once been white.

Store management was on him like ants on sugar.  Like police, their walkie talkies became their most useful tool in their apprehension of this mumbling, shrieking lunatic.  Two men followed him, keeping their distance in anticipation of his next wild move.  Two more small groups of employees gathered on the fringes of the situation.  I remained alone, watching and listening, hoping for something drastic.

I decided to get my buddy involved.  In the back room, he was stoned and oblivious to the situation -- the free show that was unfolding before our eyes.  He joined me by the potatoes.  All I had to tell him was, "Dude, this dude's pants just fell down!  Come check this out."

He looked at the savage man through squinted eyes and said, "Oh, that guy?  I love it when he comes in.  You've never seen him before?"

Gert at the Grocery Store (fictionalizing a real scene)

Gert walked into the grocery store clutching her cane, as though it were the one object that kept her stapled to the earth.  A magnet that, if released, would plunge to the core of the earth and fling Gert the opposite direction, into orbit.  She stood in the air-conditioned buzz of the store and made her way to the motorized cart area.  Typically there is a row of at least two or three along the store’s front wall, but that day there were none.

            Bewildered, and feeling a bit lost, Gert canvassed the narrow glimpses of customers.  In doing so, she spotted a middle-aged woman on a cell phone, riding around with ease in a motorized cart.  With no obvious handicap, other than grotesque obesity, the woman looked greedy for driving the cart.  No cast, no crutches, just a basket full of frozen pizza and boxed junk food.  Gert felt slighted at the sight of the woman.

            “Excuse me, young man?” Gert asked a male employee no older than 17 with shaggy hair flopping against his face as he sped along the polished floor.  No response.  Gert noticed a slight turn of the head as he walked by, as if he had heard himself addressed and decided he’d rather continue walking.  He pushed his way through a door marked, “Employees Only.”

            Moments later, from the same door, emerged a trio of older men.  As they split, presumably from their lunch break, one of them wearing a blue dress shirt and tie walked in Gert’s direction.  His dress shirt showed people that he was in charge of at least a portion of the store’s operation, but the name tag around his neck – identical in style to all store employees – made him seem more approachable.  This man approached her rather than her reaching out to him.  “Can I help you find something, ma’am?” the man asked her with a practiced look on his face.  It was then that Gert realized that she must have looked silly standing where she was, in the middle of a high traffic area of the store.  People had been steering their carts around her since she entered the store.

            “Yes.  Haven’t you got any of those battery powered carts around?”

            The man’s head turned automatically to the empty place where they are usually parked.  He then looked in a second direction, likely a secondary location where they seem to end up sometimes.  “You know, I don’t see any around.  Sometimes people leave them outside when they get in their cars; I’ll go check.  I’ll be right back.”

            “Oh, thank you so much,” Gert was pleased with the man’s effort, and a full-dentured smile appeared on her face.  He had a kind way of speaking, like he’d been handling dilemmas similar to this one for decades.  Gert backed out of the flow of grocery cart traffic to wait.

            When the man walked back inside she could tell he hadn’t had any luck.  His lips were pursed until he opened them, shook his head and said, “Well there aren’t any outside either, ma’am.”  He left the end of the sentence in a way that said so Gert, “Don’t know what to tell ya,” without being so blunt.

            “Oh, well, that’s fine.  I’m sure they’re expensive machines.  Can’t expect you to have a dozen of them!”

            The man nodded with his hands on his hips and said simply, “Yeah,” elongating the end of the word, suggesting regret for the inconvenience.

            “I’ll just sit and wait for one to be returned.  Thanks for your help,” and she looked at his chest for his name tag, adding, “Gary.”

            “Not a problem, ma’am.  Sorry again,” and he walked away.