Dental Dam(n)

Although I have a respectable vocabulary and command of the English language, I struggle sometimes to illustrate to you, dear reader, just how opposite to me on the spectrum of values the women I work with truly are.

I can talk about the evils of WalMart all I like, but when a struggling family needs clothes for their children, being able to buy three shirts for $5.00 is difficult to argue. Or a flat of Kraft Dinner. People like the WalMart Girls can't actually afford to give a shit about the Indonesian women and children working in sweat shops for Kathy Lee for pennies a day.

That being said, I can't understand how these women are so chronically impoverished either. They are all partnered to men who have good jobs, even if they themselves are at a full-time pink collar job that nevertheless pays infinitely better than Tim Hortons or McDonalds or most retail positions. They have a benefits package that is quite excellent.

But, alongside the constant bitching about money, what I also hear them talking about is purchases they make: quads, huge plasma tvs, brand new computers, phones, cameras...and it occurs to me that shopping at Walmart isn't a necessity because they are poor. They're not poor. They're just stupid with their money.

That's actually a bit of a judgement call. What they choose to do with their money is up to them, after all. I just don't understand why you would spend your money on two quads (or a quad and something called a side-by-side, which I think is a vehicle that requires not a license but a red neck to operate), dropping so much money on what are essentially toys that you panic when you have a car repair bill that comes to $300.00.

Still, these are the choices made by the average Albertan, I suppose. And god love 'em for supporting an American-based corporate giant that destroys local economies, ruthlessly exploits their employees with draconian labour standards and supports appalling sweatshops all over the world. The WalMart Girls are essentially wiping their asses with the Canadian flag, but you gotta love them for stubbornly making the most uninformed, back-assward and lazy choices they possibly can.

Don't ya? And you can't blame them really when Canadians themselves are willing to sell institutions like The Bay or Tim Hortons or the image rights of the RCMP and many other iconically Canadian products to American corporations. But that's for another rant.

Spending habits aside, there are plenty of other ways that the WalMart Girls stand opposite to me in our world view.

Take, for example, one of the WalMart Girls I haven't discussed yet. I'll call her Mrs. Orange, cuz she's a fucking rat. Her mother-in-law can't stand her. The feeling is mutual. Mrs. Orange was telling us at break a few weeks ago that she was going out after work to find a pay phone, in order to call Employment Canada and AISH (for long-term disability benefits). It was her intention rat out her mother-in-law for drawing both unemployment and AISH payments (a big no-no) while vacationing in the Dominican Republic (even bigger no-no). Mrs. Orange had to do it from a pay phone to guarantee her anonymity, since she had the wit to realize that her husband might take it amiss that she was diming out his mom to the feds. And Mrs. Orange had a reasonable expectation that this might--just might--have a negative impact on her marriage.

Clever girl. Morally bankrupt, but clever.

Still, I don't know the whole backstory and maybe the mother-in-law is a real cunt who has it coming. It's just that personally, I can't imagine doing anything quite so base and nasty to someone my wife/partner/husband cared for, nor jeopardizing my relationship with her/him, for the sake of petty vengeance. Call me crazy, but if the truth ever comes to light, exactly how do you explain your actions to your partner? Anything you say is going to sound really lame, and you will simply expose yourself as the small, cowardly and unimaginative shitheap that you are.

I don't understand the mentality that dictates if you have more, I must therefore have less, and the balance needs to be corrected. I believe in psychology, that is called an "insufficiency tape" and a lot of people seem to have it on a constant loop.

Another way in which the WalMart Girls stand opposite to me on things is with regard to how they view and talk about visible minorities. We have in our office one single woman of colour, a nice lady from Hong Kong who I will call Mulan. Just this week, and a couple of times in the past, a WalMart Girl I will call Sylvester (due to a lisp that causes all of her "s"s to be very sibilant) has talked openly in front of Mulan about "this Chinaman (I) used to date." The first time Sylvester used the word Chinaman in Mulan's presence--without apparent embarrassment or self-consciousness--I damn near fell over. I looked at Mulan to gauge her reaction, but she seemed to ignore it. I was appalled. Absolutely appalled. I mean, even if Sylvester is liberal enough to "date a Chinaman", she could choose her words better. She could, for example, use his name. I can't recall if his ethnicity was relevant to the story or not.

Anyway, as per the orthodontic nature of the title to this post, there is of course an anecedote regarding Teeth for today. (She's been pretty quiet on the old gay theme for the past couple of days: the only time it came up was when Mulan toasted a blueberry bagel during our break, and Sylvester remarked that the staff room smelled "fruity". Teeth looked at me and giggled like the asshole she is. I ignored her pointedly, but noted it down in my gay daytimer. Stupid bitch.)

Anyway, I differ from the WalMart Girls in some pretty significant ways, obviously. I spend my money differently, but they might also raise an eyebrow at me for buying rapiers, daggers and rubber band guns so I can chase my equally geeky friends around pretending to be Cavaliers and Indians. And who could blame them?

I find tattle-taling reprehensible, especially as adults when we have our own power and don't need other adults to make the world fair, especially when we have enough money to be comfortable. But as I said, I don't know the whole story there. There might be a lot more to it (though frankly, I doubt it, given the general moral timbre of the office).

And I cannot even conceive of using a perjorative racial slang in the presence of someone who represents that particular ethnicity. It reminds me of that scene in Grand Torino, when Clint Eastwood addresses the black gangbangers as "spooks". I damn near shit my pants with horror. I had a similar reaction to Sylvester. I mean, holy Jesus, can you not hear yourself talking??? On the other hand, she did date the guy. (Weak argument, I know.)

But today, Teeth demonstrated yet again how removed we are from one another in thought and opinion and philosophy. At afternoon break they were gabbing about their kids and what they want to be when they grow up. Wolf Woman's son (who is seven, I think) wants to be a judge and "I'm gonna buy a mansion and you can live in it with me, Mom". So cute. (I could make a snarky remark here about how so many of the WalMart Girls's husbands seem to have married a mommy and not a spouse, but I'll let that go for now.)

Teeth was looking through the new Regal catalogue during this conversation and braying with delight over the toilet coffee mug and the fanny bank that farts whenever a coin is deposited. Oh, and the magnetic bandaids that go on the rust spots of your car.

Her crotch fruit is named--not surprisingly--Brandi (yes, with an "i"; what were you thinking?). Brandi is six in a couple of weeks. Brandi wants to be a cop, which is hardly surprizing: her mother is a bully, so there's no reason she shouldn't want to be one also. I mean, you go where the power is, ostensibly, and even a six-year-old has enough sophisitication to know who wears the jockstrap in that family.

I wasn't impressed, but neither was I surprized. What blew me away was what Teeth said next: "I'm thinking she should become an actress. Or a model. I look at her sometimes and think, 'Toddlers and Tiaras'."

There was a pause. And then Teeth added, "And then she can marry a rich hockey player."

"Wow," I said, looking at my watch, "my break's over."

Now, to be fair, much of this was said in semi-jest. Most of what Teeth says, if you haven't guessed by now, is couched in semi-jesting tones. Yet there was enough conviction in her voice to indicate to me that turning her kid into JonBenet Ramsay wasn't entirely out of the question. And while I am no fan of (most) children, I find children's "beauty pageants" absolutely abhorrent.

Yet I doubt seriously that Teeth will ever get it together enough to inflict that form of abuse on Brandi. Not because she could ever conceive it as abuse, mind you.

It's just that you can't buy those outfits at WalMart.