You May Think That I'm Out Of Hand, That I'm Naive, I'll Understand, On This Occasion, It's Not True, Look At Me, I'm Not You
--"Regret", New Order
I was bored. We all were.
We'd been sitting and waiting for the plane to board, but that wasn't to take place for another three hours. It was agony, pure agony, not being able to leave and not wanting to stay cooped on the ridiculously old and unwanted seats at the gate. We tried passing the time talking, then playing card game after game, and eventually we'd resorted to the grumbling annoyance of actually listening to our parents and sitting still in silence. As aforementioned, I was bored and out of boredom comes some of my most inspired ideas. Though, to be fair, I'm not quite sure who thought of the notion first. It seems like something I would think of, but I don't want to claim credit when I'm not fully certain I deserve it.
Basically, the four of us, my brother and my two cousins were sitting there when we were sent to return one of the smart carts provided back to the stand from whence it came. When the shiny quarter came dropping out once the cart had locked into place, we had found our new diversion. Sure, a quarter doesn't seem like much, even adjusting for the late 80s economy, but it wasn't the monetary rewards we were after. We were looking for a diversion.
We began our search scanning for abandoned carts at gates up and down the terminal we were in. Slowly we began to find a couple. We would rack them up and return them two or three at a time. There we were, running through the airport, carts in front of us, trying to return them as quickly as possible in order to look for some more. Of course, we divided the loot evenly four ways. Yet, at a quarter a pop, it was slow-going to say the least. This continued for about an hour until slowly all the abandoned carts began to become more and more scarce.
Not wanting to go back to our parents and still with two hours to kill, we all knew some new tactics would be needed if we were to further our cause. We began asking people who were about to board if they were done with their carts. This tactic too soon began to pay dividends as group after group relented us to doing them a favor. I daresay that some of them may have even though we were sanctioned by the airport as a courtesy service as I remember being offered a tip or two. After we'd grown more brazen, the wagon trail of carts we were returning soon became eight to ten deep with all four of us needed to keep them in line. This facilitated even bigger rewards for less effort, as we stopped having to search high and low and allowed the carts to come to us. All in all, it was turning into a really fun time. By the time this stage of the operation came to an end, we'd pocketed almost twenty dollars between us.
I think where it all went wrong is when we stopped asking people if they were done with the carts. We would watch a couple or maybe a family unload their luggage onto the baggage check-in and then we would zoom in to abscond with their cart before they had a chance to complain. More than once, we'd watch them scratch their heads in bewilderment as to how swiftly we reclaimed their carts. From there, it was a short leap to emptying the carts ourselves while their backs were turned and then getting the hell out of Dodge before they realized what us guttersnipes were up to. It became like a game to us. People started warning other people that we were trying to steal their carts and then the yelling and chasing would began. But it wasn't like we were trying to steal their luggage; we were doing it all for quarters. It seems silly, but it became sort of our mission for the night.
This continued for another couple of hours until something happened to spoil our fun.
it's nothing I regret
I had started to empty this one family's cart while they had settled into some nearby seats to talk among themselves. I had it almost completely empty when their young son, who couldn't have been more than five or six, saw what I was doing. Upon his face came this look of terror I hadn't thought I could cause in a person. He must have assumed I was trying to take his belongings. Yet instead of warning his family, he just continued to stare at me like a deer caught in headlights. To him I had become the big, bad monster and he was powerless to stop me. I stopped in my tracks. Hell, I almost started to put the items back, so profound was his look of terror. Yet I continued to the bitter end and within moments I was pushing their cart back to the rack.
I don't know why I continued. I know why I didn't just stop then and there. All I can say it was one of the first times I realized that there is a part of me that is sufficiently willfull and puts what I want to do before what most people would consider the right course of action. That night, at that moment, it was more important to me to take their cart for a stupid quarter than to put that boy's mind at ease.
It's nothing I'm proud of, but it's nothing I regret either. At most, I can justify my actions by saying that I may have inconvenienced them for a spell but I did not do any lasting injury.
Maybe, just maybe, I may have scarred that kid's psyche for life, but, the way I look at it, if a kid is that scared about a guy taking his cart then he has more serious problems to deal with than me.
The four of us stopped stealing carts after that. Mostly because it was almost time for the plane to take off, but it also stopped being fun after that incident. Before we knew it, it became less of something that the people we were basically stealing from could laugh at to something where we were quite literally being hated for. At the time, we sloughed it off as the misunderstandings of old fogeys who couldn't see we were merely trying to pass the time. But I'm starting to see that it might have gotten out of hand and turned from something purely fun into something a little nefarious.
I'd like to think that if I had a chance to do it over again I might have returned that kid's cart. But something tells me that that part of me that doesn't give a fuck about people I don't know is still alive and well. He might not come out as often as he once did, like that one night in the airport, but he still makes an apperance upon occasion.
It's just who I am and I know that.
My name is mojo. I steal carts and I like it.
Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers
I was bored. We all were.We'd been sitting and waiting for the plane to board, but that wasn't to take place for another three hours. It was agony, pure agony, not being able to leave and not wanting to stay cooped on the ridiculously old and unwanted seats at the gate. We tried passing the time talking, then playing card game after game, and eventually we'd resorted to the grumbling annoyance of actually listening to our parents and sitting still in silence. As aforementioned, I was bored and out of boredom comes some of my most inspired ideas. Though, to be fair, I'm not quite sure who thought of the notion first. It seems like something I would think of, but I don't want to claim credit when I'm not fully certain I deserve it.
Basically, the four of us, my brother and my two cousins were sitting there when we were sent to return one of the smart carts provided back to the stand from whence it came. When the shiny quarter came dropping out once the cart had locked into place, we had found our new diversion. Sure, a quarter doesn't seem like much, even adjusting for the late 80s economy, but it wasn't the monetary rewards we were after. We were looking for a diversion.
We began our search scanning for abandoned carts at gates up and down the terminal we were in. Slowly we began to find a couple. We would rack them up and return them two or three at a time. There we were, running through the airport, carts in front of us, trying to return them as quickly as possible in order to look for some more. Of course, we divided the loot evenly four ways. Yet, at a quarter a pop, it was slow-going to say the least. This continued for about an hour until slowly all the abandoned carts began to become more and more scarce.
Not wanting to go back to our parents and still with two hours to kill, we all knew some new tactics would be needed if we were to further our cause. We began asking people who were about to board if they were done with their carts. This tactic too soon began to pay dividends as group after group relented us to doing them a favor. I daresay that some of them may have even though we were sanctioned by the airport as a courtesy service as I remember being offered a tip or two. After we'd grown more brazen, the wagon trail of carts we were returning soon became eight to ten deep with all four of us needed to keep them in line. This facilitated even bigger rewards for less effort, as we stopped having to search high and low and allowed the carts to come to us. All in all, it was turning into a really fun time. By the time this stage of the operation came to an end, we'd pocketed almost twenty dollars between us.
I think where it all went wrong is when we stopped asking people if they were done with the carts. We would watch a couple or maybe a family unload their luggage onto the baggage check-in and then we would zoom in to abscond with their cart before they had a chance to complain. More than once, we'd watch them scratch their heads in bewilderment as to how swiftly we reclaimed their carts. From there, it was a short leap to emptying the carts ourselves while their backs were turned and then getting the hell out of Dodge before they realized what us guttersnipes were up to. It became like a game to us. People started warning other people that we were trying to steal their carts and then the yelling and chasing would began. But it wasn't like we were trying to steal their luggage; we were doing it all for quarters. It seems silly, but it became sort of our mission for the night.
This continued for another couple of hours until something happened to spoil our fun.
it's nothing I regret
I had started to empty this one family's cart while they had settled into some nearby seats to talk among themselves. I had it almost completely empty when their young son, who couldn't have been more than five or six, saw what I was doing. Upon his face came this look of terror I hadn't thought I could cause in a person. He must have assumed I was trying to take his belongings. Yet instead of warning his family, he just continued to stare at me like a deer caught in headlights. To him I had become the big, bad monster and he was powerless to stop me. I stopped in my tracks. Hell, I almost started to put the items back, so profound was his look of terror. Yet I continued to the bitter end and within moments I was pushing their cart back to the rack.
I don't know why I continued. I know why I didn't just stop then and there. All I can say it was one of the first times I realized that there is a part of me that is sufficiently willfull and puts what I want to do before what most people would consider the right course of action. That night, at that moment, it was more important to me to take their cart for a stupid quarter than to put that boy's mind at ease.
It's nothing I'm proud of, but it's nothing I regret either. At most, I can justify my actions by saying that I may have inconvenienced them for a spell but I did not do any lasting injury.
Maybe, just maybe, I may have scarred that kid's psyche for life, but, the way I look at it, if a kid is that scared about a guy taking his cart then he has more serious problems to deal with than me.
The four of us stopped stealing carts after that. Mostly because it was almost time for the plane to take off, but it also stopped being fun after that incident. Before we knew it, it became less of something that the people we were basically stealing from could laugh at to something where we were quite literally being hated for. At the time, we sloughed it off as the misunderstandings of old fogeys who couldn't see we were merely trying to pass the time. But I'm starting to see that it might have gotten out of hand and turned from something purely fun into something a little nefarious.
I'd like to think that if I had a chance to do it over again I might have returned that kid's cart. But something tells me that that part of me that doesn't give a fuck about people I don't know is still alive and well. He might not come out as often as he once did, like that one night in the airport, but he still makes an apperance upon occasion.
It's just who I am and I know that.
My name is mojo. I steal carts and I like it.
Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers
posted by mojo shivers @ 11:37 PM
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