Memories I Hate: That Lady at the Surf Shop

There are memories that come back to me with picture perfect quality all the time. Not important memories or meaningful memories, like the day my son was born or that time I got a Louis Vuitton purse, but annoying and disturbing memories. The memory I am thinking of in particular floats through my mind regularly, I was hoping that maybe if I give the memory to you it will leave me alone and allow a memory I would like to have take it’s place, my bachelorette party would be nice (I have no idea what happened that weekend). 

 

In my mid twenties I was going shopping at a surf shop, a store full of clothing designed for teenage girls that I was way too old to be wearing, but I live in Southern California and grown women dressing like adolescent girls is accepted fashion. As I approached the glass doors of the store, that were framed by black and white posters of beach blonde guys with six pack abs performing difficult surfboard maneuvers, I noticed there were two women deeply involved in a conversation blocking the entrance, completely. One of the women had a hand on the handle of the door as though she was going to enter and forgot because her conversation had stopped her mid door opening. 

 

I needed to get into this surf shop, they had a large selection of Roxy t-shirts, and I didn’t want to delay my perusing. I walked up to the women, annoyed with their lack of understanding of how doors worked and I said, “Excuse me,” and then added under my breath, “God, move out of the doorway,” in my most passive aggressive tone, just like dear mother would have done (that is not sarcasm). I brushed between the two women and headed straight to the O’neil section to look at a cropped sweater that featured an exaggerated brass button at the collar. As I was holding the inky blue sweater up, admiring its surfer girl casualness, one of the door blocking women walked up to me, with silent ninja like stealthiness, and put a hand on my arm.

 

I looked up from the sweater surprised to see this woman standing so close and touching me, people don’t touch people they don’t know often, usually for good reason. I looked at her, I didn’t say anything, she had caught me off guard, she then opened her mouth and this horrible sentence fell out of it, “My son is twelve and I was just diagnosed with breast cancer.” She stood looking at me for a breath longer and that was it. She let go of my arm, turned and walked away, and I returned to looking at the navy blue sweater with the oversized button like nothing had happened. I don’t know if anyone else that was in the store shopping for white linen drawstring pants or a hot pink hoodie had overheard the exchange, I didn’t want to know. I kept my head down, put the cropped blue sweater back on the rack, and headed to the swim suit cover ups like everything was just fine. 

This moment has been living in my memory for years, years. I hate that memory.