When The Love Runs Out, Time To Hit The Road--Part 4* (*Scroll down for Parts 1-3):

"You ruined everything you ruiner!"




“So there’s five of us--right? But there’s only four chairs in the office, so what am I supposed to do?” I asked the couple in the seats across from me on the plane. “I ran out the office to grab the chair from my cubicle. But my boss is like...”

I recounted the story--the whole story as our plane taxied out toward the runway. But afterward the bleach-blonde woman with the white leather handbag just sat there with a blank look on her face.

“That’s it?” she asked with a baffled smile when I’d finished. “That made you so mad that you quit your job? That’s nothing.”

“Oh no,” her bulky husband suddenly interjected, “I understand what got him mad.”

“You do, right?” I asked him with a thankful look in my eye. “Was my boss messing me with me or not?”

“Oh he was definitely pulling rank on you.”

“Thank you!” I exclaimed. “Pulling rank--well said. That’s just what he was doing,” I repeated as I reached across the aisle to shake the large man’s hand adorned with a college ring. “Pulling rank--that’s exactly what it was. ..In front of everybody!”

“...Whatever,” the wife responded with a shake of her head, “that’s what boss’s do.”

“No I don’t think so,” I snapped back. “There’s a way you’re supposed to treat people you work with. I see these people everyday. More than my family. I always made that guy look great. Always killed on these moronic evaluations they used to score our performance. Always...”

Suddenly I felt a light tap on my shoulder and heard a soft voice in my ear.

“Sir, I’m gonna have to ask you to be quiet while my partner demonstrates the seatbelts and points-out the exit rows.”

“What? Oh, yeah--sure” I answered with muted agitation. “Listen, get me a Johnny Walker would you please.”

“Sir, cocktail service won’t begin until we reach full cruising altitude and the captain’s turned off the seatbelt sign. Its a short flight to Maine, I hope we can get there without any trouble.”

Without any trouble? What’d this woman think? That I was gonna go apewire there on the plane? This family trip had been planned for over six months, no way I was going to fuck it up.

But as it turned out I’d already ruined everything. ‘Cause I’m a ruiner as Sherri and Terri might say from The Simpsons. Quit my job a week before our vacation so that my poor mother couldn’t sleep or eat or even speak to me on the phone due to her anger and disappointment.

Luckily I had someone to talk to before seeing the fam.

“So there’s five of us--right? But there’s only four chairs in the office, so what am I supposed to do?” I asked the cabbie as he drove me toward the hotel. “ I ran out the office to grab the chair from my cubicle. But my boss snaps his fingers at me and is like...”

“Oh hell no!” the cabbie said as we locked eyes via his rearview mirror affixed to the windshield.

“Yeah! I’m telling you, that’s what he did--in front of everybody,” I answered as I finished the story.

“You see,” the cabbie told me when I was done and we rolled up to the hotel, “that’s why I work for myself. ‘Cause I can’t take shit like that anymore. Not at my age. Life’s too short.”

“Damn right,” I said as I paid him and slapped another ten-spot in his palm. “There’s a way you’re supposed to treat people.”


* NOTE: Due to the length of this post, I'm going to split it into a few more parts. Thanks to all those who've stuck with it thus far!!