Lawn Boy(59)

“What, you mean like buy stuff?”

“No, I mean picket.”

“Picket what?”

“Pfff. Where to begin? No paid rest, no meal breaks. Inhuman wages. Sexual discrimination, urban encroachment, union busting. Don’t even get me started on sweatshops.”

I didn’t have the guts to tell him about the job application I’d submitted to Walmart not two hours earlier. But what was there to lose? Let’s face it, I probably wouldn’t get the job, anyway. And deep down, desperate as I was, I didn’t really want to work at Walmart.

“Sure, I’m in.”

“Great,” he said. “Come back at three.”

I didn’t have anywhere to be, so I just waited at the library, scanning the fiction section aimlessly. At three o’clock, when Andrew’s shift ended, he led me briskly and purposefully from the library and across the parking lot.

“Hop in,” he said.

His red Subaru was old but scrupulously maintained. Not a speck of dust on the dash. No dog hair on the seats. No errant coffee cups or empty Burger King bags. In the backseat, a bunch of hand-drawn picket signs were stacked neatly alongside a pair of walkie-talkies, some yellow rope, a case of bottled water, and a Kinkos bag full of fliers.

“Ever occupied before?” he said as we swung onto the highway.

“No.”

“Well, this is a good place to start.”

I’d heard the talk about Walmart and its shady business practices. I’m not oblivious. I remember all the hemming and hawing when they moved into town, back when I was in high school. How they were gonna put everybody out of business with their aggressively low pricing. And, well, they did, pretty much. Coast to Coast Hardware, Schuck’s Auto Supply, Payless—they all went belly up within two years. But the truth is, I shop at Walmart quite a bit. It’s got a way of stretching your money—and when you don’t have much to work with, inexpensive is a very attractive quality. Two bucks for a block of cheese? Get out of here! Ramen at six for a dollar? That’s what I’m saying. And that’s why everybody I know shops at Walmart.

But to hear Andrew tell it, Walmart was the evil overload, victimizing poor people by selling them cheap stuff. And I have to admit, he was pretty persuasive.

“The problem, as I see it,” he said, “is that a lot of people, and not just poor people, equate value with savings—like the two are synonymous. That value is measured in savings is a tenet of consumerism. It’s shoved down our throats. People forget what real value is. Money is not the only measure of value. What about quality of life? What about community? These things are more fundamental to our happiness than saving a buck.”

One eye on the road, he proceeded to explain how the value we equate with savings is only an illusion.

“Take a can of spray paint,” he said. “Say there was a hardware store next door—not that one could actually survive next door to Walmart, but just for the sake of argument. We’ll call it Richard’s Hardware.”

“Dick’s,” I said.

“Okay, Dick’s. Let’s say Dick’s and Walmart were selling the same can of spray paint.”

“What color?”

“Does it matter?”

“I guess not. But still, it helps me imagine the scenario.”

“Okay, black. The same can of black spray paint. Dick’s Hardware is selling it for three bucks.”

“Two ninety-nine,” I said. “They always get you with the nines.”

“Let’s just call it three, for the sake of argument,” he said, the slightest hint of impatience creeping into his tone. “Three bucks is reasonable. The markup is fair—not a rip-off at all.”

“Yeah, but you could probably get it for one ninety-nine at Walmart,” I said.

“I’m getting to that,” he said briskly. “The point is, the value doesn’t end there, with the savings. Let’s follow the exchange further. What happens to that extra buck? Well, for starters, Dick sponsors a Little League team. He’s also in the Kiwanis. Turns out, he votes for school levies. He has three kids that go to school with your kids. He lives right down the street from you, as a matter of fact. Once, he found your freaked-out beagle in a thunderstorm and brought it back to you. Dick shops local, he buys Girl Scout cookies, and he pays his employees a fair wage.”

“He sounds awesome.”

“He is awesome. But even if he’s not, the point is that the extra buck goes right back into the community. It keeps your sidewalks clean and your boulevards narrow. Do you want to live in a world of wide boulevards, no sidewalks, and nothing but box stores on all sides? A world where nobody walks? A world where one percent of the population accounts for eighty-five percent of the wealth?”

“Hell no.”

“Well, that’s why we’re doing this.”

Andrew made it sound like we were about to save the world. Like we were being the change we wanted. I didn’t need any more excuses to stick it to the man, believe me. Here was an opportunity to stand up and make a difference. And all I had to do was occupy space. I could do that.





Occupying Space When we arrived at Walmart, there were seven or eight young guys, mostly with beards, and one middle-aged lady in sweatpants, loitering out front. A scruffy bunch, all told, signs dangling limply at their sides. One guy was texting. Another guy was holding a boom box. The lady in sweats was smoking a cigarette and talking on her cell phone. Surely a lone blast of pepper spray would end this flagging occupation and send this group of protesters scurrying like roaches. Immediately I could see that what this protest needed was a Goble-type personality to buoy them. Somebody to go around yelling, “Get those signs up!” Somebody with a vision. Somebody who could motivate and galvanize and all that. A politician, I guess. And so I took it upon myself, the best way I knew how.