The Jerk

 The thing about working retail during a pandemic...is that you have to choose which battles to actually fight and which ones to just...let slide by.

Which is unfortunate when you have to consider your own safety when it comes to dealing with people.

Especially dealing with the antimaskers. 

Today a guy came into the store, wearing all black, no mask in sight. 

And like. Our policy has been since July that all people within the store have to wear a mask as that's our policy. 

Add on top of that that there's a mask mandate that's been in place since November requiring that people wear masks inside buildings....

It's kinda ridiculous that people still are coming into the store without masks on. 

And while many of them just forget to put theirs on, or are willing to go grab one of our free ones...

We still get the antimaskers who don't care at all about anyone but themselves and refuse to wear a mask.

Most of the time we inform the customer that without a mask they cannot be in the store. Aka. LEAVE.

But this dude?

Yah he ignored me telling him that he needed to wear a mask.

And being the only manager on duty at the time...it would have been my duty to follow up with him and be like "Sir you either wear the mask or you leave."

But then I saw what was hanging from his hip.

A gun.

Dude was openly carrying a gun in the store.

Not wearing a mask.

Like. Who knows how volatile this dick was gonna be.

He'd already refused to wear a mask.

Had a gun on his hip.

I could all too easily picture the dude being a complete idiot and drawing said gun and at minimum threatening me with it and at worse shooting me with it. 

So yah. I wasn't gonna touch that. 

Which is frustrating because it would be nice if we could just rely on people to be considerate and kind and helpful to one another. Where you can approach everyone without fear of getting hurt because of it and kindly remind them of our policies without the risk of violence possibly occuring.

*exhales*

It's so frustrating. How after a year people still are refusing to wear masks.

How after a year the fact that a person has a gun on their hip and is showing it off along with their maskless state makes it so that half of my coworkers vanish away from the guy just to ensure that they're safe.

I mean. The fact that the dude was maskless with a gun had one of my cashiers so shaken up that they needed to go take a fifteen minute break and like...the cashier never interacted with them directly.

Can people seriously not understand or realize how traumatized many retail workers have become over this past year because they've seen first hand just how many people don't care at all about the safety and protection of others?

That they have to deal with the fact that people don't care if they hurt others while we are trying our best to make sure everyone who shops in our stores is safe?

It's so frustrating.

So frustrating that this jerk had the gall to come into the store with a weapon visible and act like a dick because he can't follow simple directions and put on a mask that policy states needs to be worn. 

*exhales* 

It's frustrating.

Honestly I should have continued to talk to him and be like "Sir, we need you to wear a mask in the store if you don't want to wear a mask we have curbside pick up available for you but to be in the store you need to be wearing a mask."

At the same time though.

I really didn't want to get shot. 

*exhales*

I hate these moments. 

-Sarnic Dirchi