Baggar Vince

"Mornin', Charlie," he said to the store's manager.

"Vince. Hey. Congratulations!"

"Oh, right. Um...thank you, sir!"

"Hey. Stop by my office before you leave today, okay?" the store manager demanded more than asked.

"Okay. Will do," came the reply without a request for additional information.

Vince Barrow pulled on a green Publix apron, complete with his name tag, and got ready to to what he'd been doing for the last five and a half years—bagging groceries. It didn't pay much, but it was still a great little job for a recently-graduated college student, and especially now before he really got serious about looking for work in in his chosen field. In the meantime, he planned on working as many hours as he could to put some money aside for the proverbial rainy day.

He started working there back in high school, and once he was in college, it was his way of helping out. His parents had sacrificed so much to pay his tuition, room and board, and everything else associated with going to school, so working as many hours a week as he could on weekends and during breaks to help out seemed like the least he could do. It took some of the burden off of them, and it also allowed him a very unique opportunity he'd enjoyed since he started working there.

From the many conversations he'd had with other baggers since his first day, he was quite possibly the only one who appreciated it—or even saw it—but it was one of the things he loved most about what he called his 'jobette'. The only exception was a 76-year old man named Wilbur, a widower who'd served in Vietnam, and like Vince, he loved interacting with people of all ages.

Vince took a look at himself in the mirror hanging on the wall in the break room where he kept his apron, smiled approvingly, and headed out onto the floor, ready for another eight hours of fun. It had nothing to do with him being a good looking guy with sandy-blond hair and an athletic physique. Vince wasn't a 'gym rat', but he'd played two sports in high school and still took very good care of himself. That, plus the very attractive face he'd been blessed with, made him a hit with the fairer sex. And that, as he'd learned, was both a blessing and a curse. The self-approval came from his having stuck with this mindless job all that time and for never once having been late for work.

"Vince! Over here!" his favorite cashier called out as soon as she saw him.

"Be right there!" he called back as he headed her way.

He got to her register, grabbed a rack of plastic bags, set it on the counter, opened a couple of them up, and started dropping the customer's groceries into them.

Vince had just graduated from the University of Florida in Gainesville, but lived in the city of Ocala some 40 miles nearly due south. Ocala was a mid-sized city with almost 60,000 residents. It was large enough to have some of the big-city feel he occasionally liked, but small enough not to feel cold and impersonal, something he liked even more about his home town.

It wasn't unusual to bag a full load of groceries for someone he'd never seen been. Over the years it did had happened many times, and this was one of them. A man of about 60 was picking up what looked like supplies for a barbecue, and this time of year was perfect for being outside—assuming one liked Florida's hot, humid weather, of course.

Vince dropped the last bag in the man's shopping cart then asked him if he'd like some help, only to be taken aback by the man's terse reply.

"What? Do you think I look too damn old to take out my own groceries?" the man replied, his tone heavy with indignation.

"No, sir. Not at all. Just asking," Vince told him with a smile.

The man shook his head, snorted, then pushed the cart out by himself.

"Well. That was pleasant," Vince said just loudly enough for the woman running the register to hear.

She was Margaret Clark who was in her mid-40s, had shoulder-length red hair, and wore plastic, black-rimmed glasses. She was always friendly, and Vince couldn't help but think she saw him as more than just someone who bagged groceries for her. She was single and raising two teenage boys, and at 23, Vince realized she could be his mother had she had a child at around that same age he currently was.

Margaret was also a good 40-50 pounds overweight, and as much as Vince liked her, the thought of...well, the thought wasn't something he cared to think about. But he'd gotten used to her flirting a long time ago and let her do so anytime she wanted without any possibility of a complaint. Vince was an easygoing guy who didn't take things too seriously, and occasionally, he even flirted back, but it wasn't Margaret who made the job so interesting.

What he loved was the never-ending parade of women from between 20 and 50 who shopped there. And more specifically, it was the fact that many of them were somewhere between cute and downright gorgeous. Most were just average people, and he enjoyed the friendly banter with them as much as he did with the 'beautiful people', but it was the latter group that made the job so enjoyable.

Publix attracted people from all social and income levels, but it obviously wasn't money that held his interest. It was the enjoyment he got from talking with the women he found attractive, and especially those who flirted with him. It wasn't that he was any less polite to those he didn't see as beautiful. Quite the opposite was true. Vince treated all of them respectfully, and enjoyed talking to anyone who was sociable. But there was just something about meeting beautiful women he'd never seen before and getting to know them that made this job worth his time.

He'd hooked up with a fair number of younger, unattached women over those five-plus years, but only a couple of them more than twice, and none of them from the store. Sure, he had all kinds of opportunities on campus, but he'd never gotten serious with any college girl he'd hooked up with. After 'falling in love' in high school and getting his heart broken, he'd stuck to no-frills relationships ever since.

Something else he found interesting was how his tastes had slowly changed over the last five years. Initially, any woman over the age of about 21 seemed old to him and had no appeal. But over time, he began appreciating just how beautiful women in their late 20s and even early 30s were. And now, he couldn't help but feel the same way about quite a few women who were even in their mid-to-late 40s. Just not Margaret.

He laughed when he wondered if there would ever be a firm, upper-age boundary, but for now that seemed to be someone near 50. That said, he knew he'd be willing to at least hook up with a very attractive woman over his self-imposed age limit were he given the opportunity.

As far as the older women he found attractive, most of them were married, and having been raised by good, decent parents, married women were strictly off limits. That still left a fair amount of those who were either divorced or widowed or the very few who'd never yet been married.

Most of the unmarried types were under 30, but Vince didn't really care about how old they were or why they were unattached. He just enjoyed talking with them, and once he got to know them, it was amazing the kind of things they would tell him on the way out to their cars.

He'd also learned that many of these older women were lonely and often very lonely. Again, the ones who shared that kind of information tended to be married, and more often than not, there was an implied invitation for him to...stop by the house sometime. The 'sometime' clearly meant when their husbands were at work, and although he'd never do it, he normally joked along saying, "Yeah, sure. One of these days."

Every now and then the invitations were more direct, and at least twice before, he'd been given a phone number and told he could have 'anything he wanted' in the way of a tip. On one of those occasions, he'd been given a $20 bill in a...very creative way. Had he known, he'd have declined the cash because of Publix's no-tipping policy.

Vince laughed when he recalled how that particular woman came up behind him as he was putting her groceries away. He knew she was very, very close to him, and when she reached around him, he just smiled. What he didn't know was that she'd reached underneath his apron and placed the twenty in his jeans. Not in a pocket, though, but somewhere...in between them.

He'd learned back in junior high and had it confirmed many times in high school that he was a good looking guy, and that was something he never took for granted. Another thing his parents had instilled in him was that he'd done nothing to earn that and to always remember it could be taken away in an instant via some kind of accident.

And were he to be fortunate to live long enough, time and old age would eventually take it away no matter how hard he tried to hold onto it. It was purely the luck of the draw, and while it was often an advantage in life, he'd been taught to never get full of himself or treat anyone not so genetically blessed as though they were any less important due to their lot in life's 'lottery of looks'. And, when the attention became obsessive, as it had two or three times, those same looks felt like more a burden than a blessing.

So as the grumpy, old man snorted and pushed his way by, Vince did his best to stay cheerful and upbeat knowing that there were good days and bad days, and that applied to customers, as well. For all he knew, the man may have just lost a job or even a loved one. It was more likely he was just an unhappy man, but because he had no idea what the truth was, he always gave people the benefit of the doubt.

For the next several hours, there was a steady stream of customers, and Vince knew nearly all of them by face, and most of them by name. He could also predict who'd be there depending on the time and day of the week, as many shoppers had a strict routine they adhered to.

"Mrs. Harris. How are you today?" Vince asked halfway through his shift when the attractive, mother of two came through a few minutes later. She was the older woman who'd 'slipped him the twenty'.

She smiled at him, leaned closer then said, "Me? Oh, I'm...still waiting."

He didn't bother pretending he didn't understand, he just smiled and said, "Ah-hah."

Undeterred, she told him, "Yep. The kids are both in school and my husband is at work, so..."

"I see. Good to know," he cheerfully replied as he continued bagging.

She chatted him up all the way to her SUV, and when they got there, she popped the hatch so he could load up the bags.

"I can't say I'm not disappointed that you don't take me seriously, Vincent," she told him.

When he didn't reply, she continued talking, and her next words were as surprising as 'Grumpy Gus's' had been earlier that day.

"All kidding aside, I have to say I hope my son grows up to be the kind of young man you are."

He turned to look over his shoulder, glanced at her and smiled, then continued loading.

"I won't bore you again by telling you just how...boring...my own sad, little life has become, or how much I'd enjoy, you know, spending some time with you. But when I think about my son being at work and some lonely, old woman hitting on him, I can't see him the way I see you, and my hope is he'd put her firmly in her place. And...I suppose that's when I realize what a fine young man you are."

Vince set the last bag in, closed the hatch, then said, "You're not old, Mrs. Harris. You're a very beautiful woman. And if I was ever going to fool around with a married woman, you'd be at the top of my list."

"But you never will, will you?" she said with no small amount of disappointment in her voice.

Rather than answer what was a rhetorical question, he smiled again then politely asked if she had any hobbies.

"Oh, sure. I have a lot of them, but it's just not the same as...you know."

She hesitated then said, "My husband barely knows I'm alive anymore, and well, that hurts. A lot."

"I'm very sorry to hear that. I don't know your husband, but I think he's a fool."

She finally smiled, sighed loudly, then tried to hand him a twenty.

"No thank you. Not this time," he told her.

"All right. Suit yourself," she told him. "So I guess I'll see you next week?"

"I'm already looking forward to it," Vince told her with a smile as he spun the shopping cart around and headed back inside, grabbing two other carts on the way.

The rest of his shift wasn't quite as...exciting...but he enjoyed it nonetheless. Once he removed the green apron, he went to the general manager's office and knocked on the door.

"Vince! Hey, come in and have a seat," Charlie told him.

He did so then asked, "What's up?"

The older man finished what he was doing on the computer, something that looked like inventory control, then turned toward the younger man and smiled.

"Dave's leaving, and I'd like you to take his spot."

Dave was David Anderson, and he was the assistant manager of the produce section.

"Where's Dave going?" Vince asked.

"Across town. He got offered a management job at another store, and he's got a wife and a kid on the way, and I don't have anything open right now, so..."

"Okay. Makes sense. But why me? I'm going to be sending out resumes and looking for, no offense, a real job, very soon."

"Let me be direct about this, Vince," his boss said. "You've been here for a long time. Everyone knows you, and they all like you. You're college educated, and you have common sense."

The older man laughed then said, "And those two things rarely seem to go together."

Vince laughed politely, knowing Charlie came up through the ranks in the store and hadn't gone to college himself.

"Here's the bottom line. I'd like you to take the job. And for the record, it's a real job, Vince. And if you do as well as I think you will, I'll find a manager's position for you somewhere when we have an opening. And, as you well know, all of our jobs pay competitive wages plus full benefits."

"Wow. I...I had no idea you were even considering me. I did know the store takes care of its employees, though, and yes, that would be a real job."

"But?" the older man asked.

Vince wasn't exactly enthused about the offer, but the extra money would certainly come in handy, and he also knew it was possible to move up the ranks within Publix. It was quite possible he could be running a store of his own in a few years, and from there, who knew?

"No buts. I just need to think about it for a day or two. Is that okay?"

"Sure, but I need to know soon, because I have to fill the slot, and..."

He reached over and showed Vince a stack of papers.

"I've got nearly a hundred resumes right here. I'm old school, so I print 'em all off, and a ton of them have college degrees, and a few even have some management experience. But you're a known quantity, and I prefer to promote from within. So give it some thought and let me know as soon as you can."

"I will, Charlie, and thanks for thinking about me."

"You're a good kid, and like I said, you're always on time which means you're dependable. And these days, that's half the battle," Charlie told him, a rare smile accompanying the compliment.

"Okay. I'll let you know ASAP," Vince told him as he got up to leave.

"And tell your folks I said hello."

Vince laughed and promised he would.

As he drove home, he found himself giving some serious thought to something he'd never even considered. That evening, he sat down with the smartest man he knew and asked his father's opinion.

"You could do a lot worse," his dad told him frankly.

Wayne Barrow, was above all else, a practical man who'd sold insurance for the last 30 years and done quite well at it.

"Like everything else, it's all about what you want out of life. If money is the be-all, end-all, you should use your business degree and become...I don't know...a hedge fund manager or something. But Publix pays pretty well, and you really can move up their...food chain."

Vince laughed then replied.

"Money's important, but it's not the most important thing."

"I agree. Not having enough is no fun at all. Your mom and I know that first hand."

Vince had heard the stories many times, and his father spared him from forcing his son to hear them again by avoiding the 'we didn't have enough money leftover after paying bills to by a pack of gum' story.

"But beyond a certain point, it won't make you any happier. But only you can decide how much that is. And let's be honest, with your degree, you could make a pile of it in this economy."

Vince knew the economy was doing well. He also knew that any economy was temporary. No matter who was in office, the economy went up and down. It was currently up, but eventually, another recession would come and home values would plummet. It, too, would end, there would be another boom, real estate values would soar, and then it would all come crashing down yet again.

"Also, you have to decide if you want to stay around here or maybe test the waters someplace else," his father told him, opening up a subject that was very important to his mother.

Vince hadn't been a homesick kid when he was at school, but then, he was only an hour away from home, so he'd never really spent any amount of time anywhere else. A part of him wanted to move to some part of the country he'd never seen, but he knew his mother would be sick if he did.

"I'd miss you and Mom, but there's nothing else tying me to Ocala," he observed without sounding like he was anxious to 'get out of Dodge'.

"True. But one day, when you settle down and have kids, it'll be nice to have Grandma to watch them while you and your wife are at work. And maybe one day I'll retire, too, and I wouldn't mind having a grandson—or granddaughter—to hang out with."

His dad hesitated then said, "Assuming, of course, she'll have a job outside of the home and need someone to watch the kids."

Vince laughed and told his dad that was a long way down the road.

"You never know, son. I said something very similar before your mom walked into the auto shop I was working at when I was around your age."

Vince had heard that one more times than he could remember, too, and before his dad could tell it, he recounted some of the details of their first meeting in hopes of heading him off at the pass but to no avail.

"Yep. That's how it all started. Just like you, I'd recently graduated from college, and was in no hurry to get a job where I wore a shirt and tie to work. I was enjoying being footloose and fancy free, and the last thing on my mind was settling down."

His son smiled then said, "And then you saw Mom."

His dad laughed and said, "Yes, I did. And man, did she knock my socks off!"

At 51, Vince's mom was still an attractive woman. Then again, his father was a good looking man, and he knew whatever looks he'd inherited were a direct result of that good fortune.

"My ears are burning!" Vince's mother, Denise, said as she walked in and asked why they were talking about her.

"Dad was telling me the 'how we met' story."

"Oh, my lord! Again?" she said as she sat down by her husband who put his arm around her. Vince couldn't help but notice how she curled right up with him even after over 25 years of marriage.

"Best thing that ever happened to me," his father said, mostly to his wife.

She looked at him then kissed him before asking her son if this meant he'd met someone.

"No. Not at all, Mom."

Her husband explained the gist of the conversation, and just the thought of her son staying in town caused her to perk right up.

"Publix is a very good place to work," she said before telling another story Vince had heard many times about her friend's husband who'd gone from bagging groceries to being in charge of several stores.