duct tape, shake weights, and teddy bears.

by Trey

It was a rainy Wednesday in Music City, and some friends and I decided to temporarily forgo the protective normalcy of our college campus to buy some college essentials at the local Walmart.

[you know, Ramen noodles, Nerf guns, and the like.] 

We were making our way around the store, and I stopped in the paint section--as I always do--to look at the duct tape to see if they had come out with any new colors or designs that I could add to my collection. 

(Yes, I shamelessly collect duct tape, and I make things out of it. 104 rolls and counting, suckas!)

My friends were in various aisles around me during this time, when I went to find them.  We all met up around the lighting aisle, and went back to wandering the store.

Something happened in that lighting aisle, however. 

The cheap lamps and bulbs had mysteriously transformed us into four-year-olds, rather than the knowledge-thirsty collegiate academics we truly are.

This, friends, can get you into trouble. 

Touching items on the shelves, grabbing pillows, and making stupid jokes about useless products that were given the label “as seen on TV.”  

{i.e. the “Shake Weight.”  What. The. Heck.}

It was the Christmas season, so random carts had been left around the store filled with toys and other items for sale.  

As we were gallivanting around the store acting “less than our actual age” (and when I say “we,” I mostly just mean “I”), I saw one of those carts filled with random items, including a particularly black, soft, and fluffy-looking teddy bear.

I neared the cart, and reached out to touch this bear on its head. 

Suffice it to say, not everything is as it seems.  

The instant this teddy bear's head moved, I no longer saw a bear but instead, a very small Hispanic child, who had been innocently riding in his parents' shopping cart.

As my hand touched his head, his face turned toward mine, and I realized what I had just done.  

I screamed and quickly vacated the area, not looking anywhere but forward.

I'll never know if that child's parents saw me approach their boy as though he were a billy goat in a petting zoo.

And you know what? 

You have never lived in complete fear until you accidentally pet a stranger’s head, not knowing if that small stranger’s parents saw you.

And that was the time I pet a child at Walmart.