*08.17.2003 - 9:13 p.m.*

Working where I do, you meet many different people. Some of them are OK, some are not so OK, some make you want to say "Screw all this, let the cockroaches take over."...and a rare few re-awaken your hope that humans aren't totally f*cked, and that the world isn't so bad. Yesterday, I met two people who re-awakened my hope for humanity.

The first was a very nice gentlemen. It's was a fairly normal transaction. I rung up his books, opened his CDs, he paid with a credit card and left. However, the thing that made this otherwise simple transaction incredible was...the very nice man had no arms.

He carried his books between his shoulder and the side of his face...must like you hold a phone. How he got his books and CDs, I have no idea. I took the books from him, and he asked me if I could open the CDs for him, which I did. As I was doing all that he got out his credit card that he had taped around his leg. He took the credit card out and placed it on the counter with his feet. I rang the card through, and put the slip of paper and the pen on the counter. He reached up with his foot, grabbed the pen and paper, put them on the floor, and wrote his signature with his foot. He then put the pen and paper back on the counter. His very neat and rather long signature was identical to the one on his card. I told him that he was the most incredible person I had met that day, then I put everything in his bag, put the bag on his shoulder, and he left.

About an hour later, I was putting some sidelines away, and I saw a guy and gir looking at some plastic wrapped journals. I asked them if they wanted me to unwrap one of them so they could see it. The girl snapped back "No! I just wanted to see if it was suade, because I'm gonna buy it!" She then swiped the book off the sheft and went to the line for the registers. Theguy gave me an apologetic look and followered her. About 15 minutes later the girl came back to me. She said "I'm sorry about the way I acted. I just came back to apologize." I said that it was Ok, she apologized again and left.

That had never happened to me before.

In one night I had learned that humans really can adapt to almost anything, and that courtesy and respect for others wasn't a completely forgotten thing. It was a good night to have lived. I don't think I'll forget it anytime soon.