It Takes a Ramp

It time to hang this tower's can out front.  It has been closed for far too long.  And I get to do the hiring around here.

So with my return to Tower Tales, I bring a tale from the tower.  A first hand experience with the oh so wonderful public.  A word of warning.  This one has profanity, and a lot of it.  In an effort to make it more palatable to the masses I shall replace a familiar vulgarity with its recognizable euphemism, "eff".

You know.  For fuck.

It had been a busy day.  The warm weather, water, and sand combined with inconsistent moderate surf had kept us on our toes and, more often than not, cycling through our collection of shorts in order to avoid the much dreaded crotch rash.  A wet suit on the willy and thighs will turn said anatomy into hamburger meat over the course of a tower shift.  You can always tell the lifeguard rookies from the vets by the number of wet red trunks hanging from the tower railings.  None?  Well that fellow hasn't learned.  And he is probably walking bowlegged.

But I digress...

The busy day in question had finally paused to catch its breath and in doing so, allowed the lifeguards to do the same (and once again change suits).  I returned to my tower to grab a jacket in anticipation of the approaching evening's chill.  I looked up from inside my tower and noticed a large, fem-mullet sporting, forty-ish female setting up camp on my ramp.  Not by my ramp.  On my ramp.  In other words this tank-top Tammy had just parked her junker-in-the-trunker in front of the fire station.

No bueno.

Now I always endeavor to extend to the public the common courtesy of a smile and the assumption that their stupidity is actually ignorance.  Even though her clothes were wet telling of her recent swim, she probably hadn't seen us making rescues.  Her leaning against my railing with legs out-stretched must have appeared to her to be the perfect pose at the perfect location for the perfection she sought with respect to her tan.

I left the interior of my tower with a smile stretching across my face.  She turned her eyes, but not her head in my direction.

"Excuse me, Ma'am," I offered, "but unfortunately you cannot block my ramp.  I need to keep it open in case I have to make a rescue."

"I need to relax, okay?!" she barked chasing my words away as though a pitt on the heels of a postman.

"Okay..." I responded, quickly gauging the volatility of the patron, and evenly continued.  "And just how long do you need to relax?  You are on my ramp and I would hate to knock you over if I had to run down and make a rescue."

"I'm a human being!  I just need 30 seconds, okay!  Is that too much to ask?!" She hadn't turned from her original position.  She was still facing away from me, while looking in my direction.

I actually started scanning the surrounding beach to see if Alan Funt was in the house.  Somewhere Candid Camera had to be rolling.

Hoping that thirty seconds would be enough (and knowing full well that it wouldn't) I acquiesced.  The détente between surf and swimmers allowed for it.  In the public arena, sometimes the deferral to another can quickly move a storm through the area.  And, heck, if I had to knock her over on my way to another rescue, so be it.

I returned to the interior of my tower.  She took root at the end of my ramp.  I sure you can guess where this is going.  It's like watching a film trailer and then going to see the film.  The trailer teased action you haven't yet seen so you know that bitching gun battle is right around the corner.  Where's the promised profanity, right?

Thirty seconds became a minute, and a minute became two.  I had given her a chance.  Mary Mullet had to go.

"Excuse me, ma'am..."

"FUCK YOU!" she bellowed, "I'm an effing human being, goddamnit!  Treat me like a effing human being!  All I effing asked was for one effing second to effing relax on your goddamn effing precious ramp and you can't effing treat me like an effing human being!  EFF YOU, you effer!  EFF-EFFING YOU, you EFF!!"

Um...okay.  Other than my set up, did you see that coming?  I sure as hell didn't.  Now normally, I admit, I can get kinda cranky when the public PERSISTS in being, well, the public.  In this instance, her unexpected tsunami of profane anger actually left me speechless.  And rather amused.

"Ma'am..." I calmly responded.

"No!  EFF you!  Eff you and eff your effing ramp!  I'm an effing human being, you effing asshole (oh, hey, she's mixing it up, opting for other vulgarities.  Good for her)!

"Ma'am..."

"You can effing go to effing hell for all that I care, you effing EFF! Eff you!"  Obviously she had thrown a c-note in the swearing jar and intended to cash it all in.

"Ma'am, I can see that you are upset, but I cannot have you stay on my ramp."  I replied, finally getting a word in edgewise.  I say I understated the case, don't you think?

"EFF you!  Eff YOU!  EFF YOU!  You are a heartless effing bastard!"

At this point, we have an audience.  The earshot public who had initially been acting as though they were not paying attention even though they absolutely were had now turned their chairs in our direction. They flagged down the passing ice cream vendors for munchies and sent the kids off to find popcorn.  This was quality entertainment and they weren't about to miss it.

Also not missing it was what must have been a friend if I can call him such.  As she kept pulling the pin on and hurling her eff-grenades as quickly as she could grab them, he approached.  Out of what could have only been embarrassment, he shielded his face with his hand.  And me?  At the top of my ramp I held the high ground.  With arms across my chest,  I smiled.  This sent her into an even more profanity-laced tizzy - one that I will spare you.

As her friend led her away she decided to send up Enola Gay.  "See that house over there?"  She shouted, jabbing her finger in my direction as though jabbing out my eye.  "That's my house!"

"Which house?" I asked, "There is a lot of them."

"That one!  The big effing one behind you!  That's my effing house!  And I'm having a effing party and you can't effing come!"

"Well there goes my evening plans."  I responded.

Yep, more eff bombs, but thankfully becoming fainter as she was pulled in the direction of the parking lot.

"Hey, isn't your house over there?"  I returned.  I couldn't resist.  She came back with the finger.  A salute from the captain on a sinking ship.  Give her credit, she rode that one to the bottom.

Now for those of you thinking that I omitted some inciting factor of my creation out of the above, I didn't.  This is something that can happen to any lifeguard at any time, unprovoked or otherwise.  It is part of being in the public arena.  We guard the waters to save lives.  It is how we earn those taxpayer dollars.  Yes, lifeguards are public servants, but we are not public door mats.  If the taxpayer has a need to clean some crap off of the foot, please go somewhere else other than our backs.  A therapist might be a good start.

© Copyright 2011 David S. Carpenter.  All Rights Reserved.