success

10:37 AM 10/15/10

I've gotten used to walking in the door that leads directly to the produce department. I got desensitized after failing to see him, so many times, when I went there, that I started to feel as though he didn't really work there at all, and it didn't matter if I walked directly in the front door to the produce department, because there was no chance I'd see hm. I originally was walking in the other door, the one that's farthest away from the produce department. I felt at first like I had to avoid jumping right in where he could see me.

Today I went with only the clothes on my back. I didn't bring my cell phones, and I didn't bring any money other than a couple dollars to buy something.

I went in the door directly to the produce department. I jumped right in. I walked a little way, and I saw him. It was definitely him.

I took a deep, shuddering, shaking, shivering breath. It was like a breath of ice cold air. I started shaking. I froze and didn't move. I was about to go right up to him. He was behind the counter, at the salad bar, washing some dishes at the sink. But I didn't go right to him. Instead I dived into the next grocery aisle and walked quickly away from him.

I walked up that aisle, and then I walked down the next aisle. I started looking at the shelves without actually looking at them, and I started crying. I was shaking and crying for a couple minutes, and wandering up and down the aisles.

Then I turned around and went back to him.

He looked straight at me across the counter, but he didn't see me. He has glasses, and I don't know how bad his eyes are, but for whatever reason, he didn't recognize me when I looked at him from far away. I got closer to where he was, and I made sure it was him.

At a second glance, up closer, I thought for a minute I'd made a mistake, because he had more facial hair than before. He has a mustache today. I'm not sure if he had a beard, too - not really, maybe a little bit. It's just a shadow of hair, not fluffy. But I looked and I was sure it was him.

I went around to the opening where you walk behind the counter.

'Hey!'.... (no answer)... 'Hey!'.... (no answer).... (feeling awkward and embarrassed)... 'HEY CURTIS!' He looked up and saw me and walked over to me.

He smelled sweet, it was wonderful, it was that perfume, whatever it is, very faint. I smelled him as soon as he was close to me.

And then, it was nothing. We were just two people talking to each other. We were both of us calm. 'I just wanted to say hello,' I said.

Curtis: 'You still at Weis?'

Me: 'No.' (low voice, shook my head slowly, sad smile. Am I still at Weis? If you only knew. Am I still at Weis??? Could I be there without you?)

Curtis: 'It's better here. I'm getting $8.90 an hour.'

(I had the urge to say, 'That's more than I'm making,' but I didn't say it. I've made $12/hour at a job many years ago. Our wages don't matter. All that matters is I'm seeing you. So I said nothing.)

Me: 'I won't bug you. I know you're at work.'

So he turned and looked back at the sink where he had been washing dishes, and then looked at me, and then I waved a little wave at him, and he went back to work, and I turned and left. That's all.

Less is more.

When I drove away in my car, I cried.

I don't know if I can go back and see him again. I'll find out.

********
He's clueless. Totally, completely clueless. He doesn't read my blog: that's one thing that 'they' tried to make me believe - they tried to make me believe he reads my blog. And if he doesn't read my blog, and doesn't know that I'm not at Weis, then Carrie must not have told him what I told her in my email about how I lost my job at Weis. She didn't answer that email, so she might not have gotten it. She usually answers emails. I got an email from him in reply to the email where I sent him a link to my blog. The reply said something like, 'I don't need your help, this is Curtis, no one is hacking my email,' and a couple other things. If he replied to that email and didn't even read the blog that I sent him a link to, that seems strange to me. The reply had the link in it too. I don't know if he really wrote that or not.

I know, it's confusing. It IS confusing, that's the whole point. I have had several times where I asked him if he received an email from me, and he said no. I don't know which ones he's received and I don't know what they said. I don't know if they really said what I wrote in them, or if they were changed. I don't know anything.

I know that he's there, though. I saw him. He was real. That is the one nice thing about today, I saw him there.