I'm inline at the Good Samaritan Rummage Sale - Early, this is not one to miss. I was here at 7:15 AM, the sale starts at 9:00 AM, my early arrival guarantees me about position 50 in line, even accounting for the "filling" that goes on as friends join friends ahead of you.
There's no worries today, I know all the dealers in line and only one or two are of any threat to me, the rest are idle treasure hunters who show up at every sale then disappear. I know the competition.
And I've brought the coffee to propitiate the gods, hand one to the book fairy and a couple to random strangers, my karma is secure.
I recognize many of the faces from the preceding rummage sale. This event, it has it's regulars.
At 8:30 I see an old woman, stocky, short, limping, classical Russian Babushka heading towards the sale. She's limping, she marches into the line some 10 people before me and works her way towards the front, then stands at attention, left hand behind her back. I don't see her interacting with the other customers, there's no indication that she's found her granddaughter or grandson or group of seniors friends, she's on her own.
It looks to me for all the world as if she's butted into line, and I'm dead pissed off. Bad enough that people claim "friendship" and butt into line some 10 or 20 places early despite being late, but this woman can't even claim that.
But she's old, maybe late 70's, early 80's, and so I daren't say a thing.
I go for a cigarette, it's implicit that my position will be held by the rest of the line, I meet a vendor I'm familiar with.
"Her? She does that every year. A couple of years I tried to tell her to go to the back of the line, she tells me she's sick, I tell her then she shouldn't be here...."
She's still here. Her age is the antidote to waiting in line like the rest of us, she's used the "sickness" excuse how many years in a row to get pole-position on the best garage sale in the city. But what can you say? Start an argument, try to pitch her to the back of the line and you'll be expelled.
I can't wait until I'm old....