Rewards And Realization And.....God I Wish I Was Stupid Sometimes So Thoughts Like These Would Quit Going Through My Head.

I deserved the heart attack on a plate that is a full serving of Denny's nachos. For I kicked ass this day at work.

Tech didn't show up. Tracked him down on his cellphone after half an hour and he said he had talked to the manager about taking today off. Something about his brother's graduation. Said he was sorry and he was on his way.

I thought of all the holidays I worked as an intern to avoid the family and felt a twinge of jealousy. I told him to go to the graduation, and thus sealed my fate.

They came at me with full force. Waves of them waving little papers from the urgent care. Tourists not familiar with American drug prices. People expecting faxes that were not there. Prior auths that were not understood. Phones that never quit. I was mowing it all down my friends. Then the computer crashed. And I handled that too. And could have beat out those clowns at CVS in a professionalism contest with one hand tied behind my back as well.

Because work seems to be the only part of my life functioning normally at the moment. Behind the counter the only time my brain chemistry feels normal. I mowed down the prescription madness this day in a way only an experienced professional could. And for the first time in a while all was right in my head.

Then my shift ended. My mind rewarded me with a little endorphin action and a craving for nachos. Which tells me dopamine may have been involved as well.

It was the waiter's first day. I knew it before he told me. The overeagerness gave him away. He hadn't given his all towards a customer only to be stiffed when it came time for the tip too many times yet. He would be. A few minutes after he took my order he seated a family of four in front of me and I felt a twinge of the jealousy like I felt towards my tech this morning. The family seemed normal and happy and therefore fascinated me. The waiter joked with them and made the little boy wearing a superman shirt laugh. I studied them over the top of my newspaper. It was when superman boy said he had to go to the bathroom that I first saw it. The look on Dad's face. He was tired. Distant. The joy in this family was coming solely from the lady and the kids. This guy wanted to be a million miles away from wiping his kid's ass on a Denny's diaper changing table. I looked at him and remembered my twinge of jealousy and knew he would be seething with that same emotion if he could have known of my last weekend. Any married man would have loved to had been me last weekend. Last weekend I scored in a way almost straight out of a Penthouse Forum and afterwards felt about as empty as the look on this married man's face as superman boy begged him to watch him crash two toy airplanes into each other one more time.

No one is happy. Each of us had a little of what the other wanted and neither one of us would be happy if he got it.

The waiter came back and continued to joke with the family. Things seemed to be going well until he said something about an outfit that made him "look retarded." Retarded is a word on the cusp. In 10 years it will be said in public no more. There will be a new word and in 30 years that word will no longer be said in public. Today though, retarded is the kind of word that will wrap a blanket of silence around a conversation when said in front of the wrong people. And maybe cost you a tip.

I put the nachos in my stomach and went past the time of my endorphin's first half life. I left the waiter 20% of my bill and wished him well in my mind. I worked the crossword in the paper as the dopamine slipped away. I was sated. Even if I didn't know a 5 letter word for pretentious.

Reality slowly slipped back into my brain like the tide flowing across the beach.