While walking through the supermarket last week, a guy stopped and asked me where I worked. Okay…that’s a new one. I didn’t answer but gave him my “what can I did for you aka my WTF look.” He said, “I don’t mean any disrespect but you’re a very gorgeous lady who has beautiful feet.” Uh…is this guy serious? You stopped me in the middle of a crowded store after being at work for nine hours to talk about my feet? No freaking way. This guy, who from this point on I’ll call Lenny, was directly out of the 80’s with his jheri curl and gold tooth. I kid you not. Straight Coming to America, let your soul glow look with a touch of old G…for those that don’t know the G stands for gangster (gangsta if you’re into ebonics). The idea of activator dripping anywhere in my house was unappealing. And besides, this dude was old enough to be my father and that’s pretty damn old.
I told Lenny thank you and started to walk away. He followed me down the aisle and asked how high the heels on my shoes were. Both me and my shoes are sexy, he bellowed. Normally, if a man tells you that you’re attractive, you have an aww moment and you’re flattered by the compliment. I literally cringed. I wasn’t looking for a sugar daddy and if I was, Fred Sanford couldn’t have the job. There would be no need for him to rush out and refill his Viagra prescription since I wasn’t buying what he was selling. And I swear he had a pickup truck outside that made me want to hum the theme to Sanford and Son.
He told me he wanted to take me out to dinner and purchase a pair of stilettos for me. He even offered to paint my nails a cute pink color he happened to be carrying around with him. Err…can you say weirdo. This whole conversation was being held as I pulled things off the shelves and quickly placed them into my shopping cart. He positioned the nail polish in my face like that would be the thing that would positively persuade me. Yeah because that’s what women want, strange guys that are willing to paint their toe nails. Uh…no!
Let me take this moment to say that I used to date a guy with a foot fetish. I mean he was kink…well never mind, ya’ll don’t need to know all my business. Let’s just say, we had many conversations about what color my toes were and some pictures might have been exchanged. Don’t judge me. He was cute as hell and I’d known him for half of my life. He wasn’t some creepy, stalker guy who randomly stopped people on the street like Lenny. He was more like Eddie Murphy in Boomerang. If your feet looked like you had hammer- time in your shoes then you needed not to apply.
This story gets better. So I told Lenny again that I’m not interested. He reached into his sack of tricks (an old Nike bag that probably was the first ever made – almost as prehistoric as his member’s only jacket) and produced a water bottle with the labeling ripped off. Inside was a yellow liquid. I won’t tell you what I thought it was initially. Don’t want to gross you out the way I was. He told me he made his own perfume and this was a sample of one of his fragrances. He handed me the plastic container then reached into his duffel and got out a white teddy bear. Well, at least I thought it used to be white. It was more like an off white since it was dirty and one of the eyes was missing. Is this dude serious? I mean really? Who is he picking up with these trinkets …homeless women?
I took the items and thanked him. I didn’t want to be mean and I figured if I did, he’d ultimately leave me alone. He pointed out his card, handwritten with his name and number that was taped on the bottle. If I liked the perfume or anything else I could give him a call. Uh…I wouldn’t hold my breath if I was Lenny. He probably still had a rotary phone. And besides, looked like father time, grim reaper, whoever was keeping score and from the looks of it, Lenny was losing…just saying.
I headed to the checkout line and of course Lenny followed still talking about my toes and how I should be a foot model. Do they even have those? Is that like a real profession? Oh, I show off my feet for a living – did you see me in the latest Foot Digest? Seriously? I could see the cashier laughing at me. I’m sure she was thinking better me than her. Not that I blame her but she was still a witch for being amused by my obvious pain…in the ass.
I’d completely checked out and unfortunately needed to pick up my movies from the Red Box and there was a line. Just enough time for Lenny to go through the checkout aisle also. He came up behind me while I was waiting and told me that he had something else to give me on my way out. Great…more crap to throw away as soon as I got to the nearest trashcan.
I watched as he headed towards the door but on the way he sat down in a wheelchair. Yes, I said wheelchair…I can’t make this stuff up. Well actually I can but this isn’t one of those times. His chair was loaded up with junk and I observed him as he tried to find room for the groceries he’d just bought. He finally got everything on and started rolling his way to the door. It reminded me of The Grinch That Stole Christmas. Remember when the Grinch had stolen everything and loaded it on the sleigh and that poor dog had to pull it down the hill. We knew disaster was imminent. Well, I felt Lenny was going to have similar issues.
I’d gotten my movies and ambled out the door hoping against hope that Lenny and his sleigh of doom were gone. Wrong! He was outside waiting for me. There was a truck parked right in front…the junk-mobile. Cue Sanford theme music. A man was in the driver’s seat telling Lenny to hurry up because he was taking too long and he hated driving his truck. I wasn’t surprised. Well, at least he had someone to help him with all his stuff. Lenny gave me the pink polish and pleaded with me to give him a call. I then lied (forgive me father for I have sinned) and told him that I was engaged and that my boyfriend was a cop. He wouldn’t like it if I talked to another man no matter how innocent it would be. I doubted Lenny would want to take that chance with a man that carried a gun. Oh…and I might have mentioned that he had a bad temper too. I know…I know…I’m going to hell on the express train. Choo…choo… Lenny nodded and told the guy in the truck that he was ready. I could hear the guy telling him that he needed to leave young women alone and that no one was falling for that mack sh**. Uh…if Lenny was a pimp than I’m Beyonce. No way was any female being taken in by his weak game. Is it wrong that I giggled and walked a little slower? I wanted to hear what else the guy in the truck had to say. He called him an old fool. Yup…that pretty much summed the whole thing up for me. Ancient and senile = Lenny.
When I got to the car, I opened the bottle and smelled the content. Eww…it was like a mixture of pine sol and Muslim oil. I shook my head and poured it out onto the dark gravel. I waited until I got home before I threw the bottle and beat-up stuffed animal away.
The next day at work, I shared my Lenny experience with one of my coworkers. She laughed and told me that he did the same thing to her at the market she goes to a few miles away. Apparently, Lenny gets around. The only difference was he didn’t tell her that she had nice-looking feet. Wow…a moment I can be proud of…not! She said some woman actually gave him her phone number…she witnessed the whole thing. Perhaps the lady was dizzy from the aroma of pine sol, oil, and jheri curl juice and wasn’t in her right mind. That’s the only way Lenny…could ever get any…
