Line spud seeks heavenly deal

There are many reasons I love living in the rural Northwest — the dramatic hillscapes, the aw-shucks atmosphere, the dust devils and arrowleaf balsamroot, the red-tailed hawks riding thermal wind currents, the pine-scented paradise, the peach light of early morning, the sense of spaciousness, the tradition of self-reliance and of caring how your behavior affects your neighbor.

But the main reason I love living here is the lack of lines.

The other day at a big box department store I thought I had lucked into a short line. I was the third person back. Just two people were in front of me. Both had one item to buy.

Unfortunately, the first person in line, it turned out, was as old as Methusaleh — and twice as slow.

You’ve heard of couch potatoes. This sweet-looking old lady was a line spud. She wanted to know how the doohickey she was buying worked, wanted a demonstration of each of its 29 plastic, imminently breakable parts.

I had enough time to drink a double-tall latte, watch the crush of humanity swarm past with gardening products bought in the glow of the year’s first truly warm day, experience sensory overload, feel like a rat in a maze, smell stale cigarette smells, check out the tabloids to see which star had lost so much weight she looked like Minnie the Anorexic Mouse and which star had gained enough weight to sink a yacht, absorb other mind pollution, suffer brain atrophy, all the while holding a quart of Blue Bunny ice cream threatening to hop down my leg onto the floor.

Then came progress. The line spud began writing a check. She scribbled so slowly the others in line feared that before she was done they would be transported from this earthly shopping paradise to the Big Box Store in the Sky, where heavenly deals are an everyday affair.

When things looked as if they could get no slower, this poached-brain shopper decided to balance her checkbook. And it was not just this transaction that she sought to balance. It was every transaction she had made back to the Great Depression, which is slightly better than the current one, the Good Depression.

By this time, with Blue Bunny oozing its guts, my companion and I thought we detected subtle movement in the line.

Not so.

As I began to get eyelid cramps, and the person second in line was at the anger flash point and about to spontaneously combust, it got even worse.

The insensitive line spud pulled out a tract from her purse and tried to hoist it on to the young checker, even though he was wearing a cross big enough to make him stoop almost double.

“No thank you,” he said politely. “I already read my Bible every day.”

The old wire-haired terrier knew she had a good hold on his pantleg. She insisted. “There is some really interesting stuff in here,” she said, “and because you know your Bible it will interest you even more.”

The young checker finally accepted the tract. He stuck it in his pants pocket. It was his only hope of getting the line spud to move on before the Second Coming.

Get one thing straight: I have nothing against saving souls. In fact, I admire people who take their religion seriously, who don’t treat church attendance as membership in an exclusive country club.

But save souls with a mind for how your behavior effects those around you. You might have a better chance at winning a convert.

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