a hero ain't just a sandwich

A couple of nights ago, I was getting a bag of groceries out of the front seat of my car, and oh, a playful little breeze thought it would be funny to slam my car door right into the tender meat of my upper arm. It hurt so friggin’ bad that I squatted down on the ground, rubbing my bicep and letting loose with a stream of obscenities that would have been cut from The Aristocrats for being too offensive.

The end result of this injury was, of course, a massive bruise. I tend to bruise easily, thanks to mild anemia; I always look like a banana gone bad. Trust me, though, this would have bruised anyone who wasn’t clad in a suit of armor or a Kevlar sweater. There’s not much I can do about it except slather it with vitamin K cream and wait for it to go away, and I pretty much forget about it unless I poke it while getting dressed or roll over on my arm in the middle of the night.

Last night I went to a drugstore near home to buy white cheddar Cheez-Its and pantyliners, and when I went up to the counter to pay, the same cashier I always see was working the register. We exchanged pleasantries, and he rang me up. As I dug through my wallet looking for a five, I noticed him staring at my bruise.

“Hey, um…” he said, coughing. “This is none of my business, but if someone did that to you, I will totally kick their ass.”

People have the capacity for such tenderness, right when you least expect it.