the gas station
Found Photo: Gelatin-Silver Print. From the Collection: Photographer Unknown.
When I was in high school I worked at a local 24hr gas station. It was a place where the AM and PM crowds crossed paths on their way to and from ...wherever it was they were going? In four years, I think I learned more from the gas station than I did in high school? It was there that I developed my ferocious appetite for sugar, nicotine, and bottomless cups of worse-than-dinner-truck-stop coffee. It was there that I learned about people, right and wrong, truth and lies… I probably owe more to that gas station than I do to Moby Dick or George Eastman’s Kodak. Behind the register, or from behind the cooler doors, I did more than stock and punch. – I observed. However, no matter how much I watched others, it was as if I didn’t exist? People would barely look at me, or only stop to grumble more than their pump number. Was I invisible? I don’t know, but that was how it felt… The man who came in with his wife and kids would been seen a few hours later buying condoms and cigarettes, with a different woman in toe. Every day, the same stripper slash prostitute slash crack addict shook at the hands, pulled out her change, and said nothing. But I knew her brand, so I pulled the Prime 100’s soft pack from the rack, sifted through the mess of quarters, lint, dimes, pennies, and sent her off. They didn’t see me, nor did I care. I suspect that gave me some insight, a little peep into their world, when their guard was down…when they were vulnerable.
The lotto junkies were worse than the real drug addicts. At least the narcotic deviants left the store, where as the lotto freaks stayed for hours, scratch scratch scratching and scheming. God, how I hated the lotto regulars who would torture me with their endless lists… 1879 strait, 1879 back-up, 1114 straight… 769 box…. 2 quick picks, and so on… They’d hand me crumpled pieces of paper with number after number, only to wash it down with scratch-off tickets. And this was one of those gas stations where you could smoke. I smoked, the customers smoked, the owner smoked… I smoked at the register, I smoked in the cooler. I smoked in front of customers and with customers… but the lotto freaks smoked the most. That place must have smelled like a bar on a Sunday morning, only we never closed. It was putrid, the walls were yellow and the windows stained. This was no 7-11, not by a long shot. It was a recipe for lung cancer, diabetes, and vice!
Every summer, sometimes even 2 or 3 times a year, I was given the pleasant task of repainting all the island curbs white, but only after weeding and scraping the perimeter. The sun was brutal as I painted against the black asphalt ocean. I felt like meat on a grill, while little pebbles dug through the thin cardboard under my knees into the skin, shooting pain into my neck. To add insult to injury, a group of kids from school would almost always stop in. And there I’d be, working like a mule covered in paint, standing before them, humiliated. I’d imagine where they might be off to… Maybe to the beach? Maybe a party? I’d try not to recognize them.
Acknowledgment would have just made matters worse. I knew what they were thinking and I suspect they felt my pain, or, ridiculed me. I’d try to hide, but George, the owner, would yell at me from the store, “Soak it up… get the paint in those cracks… soak it up…” I only wish I could do justice to how he uttered that phrase… He was a sure character. George was so cheap that he wouldn’t let me use paint thinner. Of course, we had plenty of gasoline!! He’d have me wash my hands in a bucket of pure 87 octane. My skin would crack and turn to hives, refusing to let the pores release that musty-sweet smell for days. Nevertheless, I soldiered on and painted those curbs like a champion. I don’t think there ever was a better curb painter than I. Besides, I never liked the beach and I’m still not one for parties.
After 4 years of what could amount to a novel in a gas station, I left for college. But as I went on to a new life, I never forgot about the gas station. A few months into school, I guess I wasn’t surprised when I got the call that Scott blew his brains out. Scott was a clerk when I started and a clerk when I left. He was a nice young guy, quiet, but always distant. I don’t think we ever talked about anything more important than the hot girl on pump 4 or the Yankee’s. Off work, he would buy us beer and we’d cruise around in his Mustang. He loved that car, and ultimately, he killed himself in it with the cops trying to talk him down. As much as I learned from that gas station, after a while, I could imagine getting dragged deeper into that universe. Sure, the monotony of a low wage unskilled job was not exactly an ego booster. -But that’s not what I’m getting at. The world can be an ugly place and that gas station was a portal into so many dark corners. The hard part is looking humanity in the face and trying not to see yourself looking back. “…Soak it up… Soak it up… get into those cracks…”
The lotto junkies were worse than the real drug addicts. At least the narcotic deviants left the store, where as the lotto freaks stayed for hours, scratch scratch scratching and scheming. God, how I hated the lotto regulars who would torture me with their endless lists… 1879 strait, 1879 back-up, 1114 straight… 769 box…. 2 quick picks, and so on… They’d hand me crumpled pieces of paper with number after number, only to wash it down with scratch-off tickets. And this was one of those gas stations where you could smoke. I smoked, the customers smoked, the owner smoked… I smoked at the register, I smoked in the cooler. I smoked in front of customers and with customers… but the lotto freaks smoked the most. That place must have smelled like a bar on a Sunday morning, only we never closed. It was putrid, the walls were yellow and the windows stained. This was no 7-11, not by a long shot. It was a recipe for lung cancer, diabetes, and vice!
Every summer, sometimes even 2 or 3 times a year, I was given the pleasant task of repainting all the island curbs white, but only after weeding and scraping the perimeter. The sun was brutal as I painted against the black asphalt ocean. I felt like meat on a grill, while little pebbles dug through the thin cardboard under my knees into the skin, shooting pain into my neck. To add insult to injury, a group of kids from school would almost always stop in. And there I’d be, working like a mule covered in paint, standing before them, humiliated. I’d imagine where they might be off to… Maybe to the beach? Maybe a party? I’d try not to recognize them.
Acknowledgment would have just made matters worse. I knew what they were thinking and I suspect they felt my pain, or, ridiculed me. I’d try to hide, but George, the owner, would yell at me from the store, “Soak it up… get the paint in those cracks… soak it up…” I only wish I could do justice to how he uttered that phrase… He was a sure character. George was so cheap that he wouldn’t let me use paint thinner. Of course, we had plenty of gasoline!! He’d have me wash my hands in a bucket of pure 87 octane. My skin would crack and turn to hives, refusing to let the pores release that musty-sweet smell for days. Nevertheless, I soldiered on and painted those curbs like a champion. I don’t think there ever was a better curb painter than I. Besides, I never liked the beach and I’m still not one for parties.
After 4 years of what could amount to a novel in a gas station, I left for college. But as I went on to a new life, I never forgot about the gas station. A few months into school, I guess I wasn’t surprised when I got the call that Scott blew his brains out. Scott was a clerk when I started and a clerk when I left. He was a nice young guy, quiet, but always distant. I don’t think we ever talked about anything more important than the hot girl on pump 4 or the Yankee’s. Off work, he would buy us beer and we’d cruise around in his Mustang. He loved that car, and ultimately, he killed himself in it with the cops trying to talk him down. As much as I learned from that gas station, after a while, I could imagine getting dragged deeper into that universe. Sure, the monotony of a low wage unskilled job was not exactly an ego booster. -But that’s not what I’m getting at. The world can be an ugly place and that gas station was a portal into so many dark corners. The hard part is looking humanity in the face and trying not to see yourself looking back. “…Soak it up… Soak it up… get into those cracks…”
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