i was at a toys r us maybe 10...15 years ago in nyc. i don't remember why i was there. sometimes you go into a toys r us as an adult to take a walk through your childhood. i am going up an aisle and i see a little kid admiring a toy and i can tell he's trying to make a decision. he grabs it and goes into the next aisle where his mom is. i can't see them, but i can hear them. he asks his mom really humbly "ma, can i get this?" and you hear the pain in her voice when she sighs "sweetie, i'm sorry, no. we can't. we can't afford that right now. we're here to get a gift for stacy's birthday. i promise we can come back soon and get it." I am still in the aisle and without seeing her, i know what she looks like. she's harried, tired, hasn't bought herself a thing in years. you can hear it in the exhale and not in anything she actually said. she's weathered. i know that sound very very well.

the kid comes back into the aisle and he dutifully puts it back on the steel rod.

I go something like "they're cool, right?" 'yeah'. this doll is like 5.99. i whisper to him "don't worry about it, i was getting one anyways. i gotchu." i go and i grab 2 and a matching something or another that goes with them. he is quietly happy and goes back to his mom. i quickly go to the register and buy them.

i am faced with the problem. i never thought through how do i not insult this woman by buying her son toys? maybe she is trying to teach him lesson. shit, do i look like a creepy pedo? fuck. i dunno. i see her go to the register and i'm like 8 or 9 feet away. her son is lingering around and i give him the bag with the receipt. i quietly take "mine" as a pretense of not being a total weirdo. i bail.

i go outside and am walking up the block and i hear a lady screaming. "mister, mister, hey!" and i see the woman chasing after me with her son in tow. "did you buy this for him?" 'yes, i did, im sorry, i didnt mean disrespect, but i know like when i was a kid and sometimes my parents couldnt afford it and i know and im so sorry i even bought this other one so that you wouldn't think i was a weirdo and...' as i stammered like a retard. And she stops me "my husband lost his job and is struggling. don't say sorry. thank you so much. jack say thank you." "thank you, mister". I give him the other one because wtf was i gonna do with an action figure? and i am walk away and i hear his mom saying "you see, some people are nice out there."

i hadn't thought of that story until right now.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36328403)

i've been there, don't worry about it." the mother is muttering "thank you thank you" with a thick assed asian accent. they bagged it up. they went out the automatic doors and the night swallowed them up.

you never know when it could happen to you, bros. life comes at you dumb fast.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36328501)

the shit you remember about things. i remember exactly what he looked like. maybe...31ish with a lumberjack shirt tucked into his pants. they both just looked skinny and tired.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36328842)

She panics and breaks down.

A complete stranger in the line behind her presses about $1500 cash in today’s money into her hands along with his address and says “I know you’ll pay me back” and boards the plane.

We still talk about that guy and send him cards.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36333217)

god damn this flame world

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36328692)

edit: might as well just offer it--the entire interaction was in spanish.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36329632)

still 180

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36329787)

JK...you're a good dood.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36329753)

fuck it. i'm waiting for traffic to die down. another story related to toys.

so it's after my graduation from law school and my wife as a surprise sets up a dinner at smith and wollensky. i am super psyched since i had never been. it was a rainy-ish night and i park on the street far away and we're walking and i'm looking around at the scenery, etcetra. and i see a toy store across the street.

i freeze dead in my tracks.

i tell my wife "we have to go across the street for a second" and she's confused by cooperates. we go across the street and i stand staring at this toy store. it's unmistakable. this is the toy store. THE toy store.

"so, when i was a little kid on like days off and during the summer my dad would take me to work. (he was a straight job truck driver for awhile and then a big rig trucker later). i would go and help him do the "inside jobs". Basically what UPS drivers do except it's commercial freight. like deliveries of dozens or even hundreds of boxes of freight. one of the regular stops for a couple of years was this toy store. this exact toy store. i used to go in here with my dad and make deliveries--back and forth, back and forth. they had a storeroom in the back and we would stack up the boxes. never higher than five boxes so they don't tip over. and i used to look at the toys and wish that i could ask my dad to buy one. but this was a real expensive toy store, ya know? like toys were 20 bucks and this was in the 80s. and here i am standing in front of this very toy store where my dad delivered toys he couldn't buy. i want to go inside."

i go inside. and i bought a yo-yo. i bought a duncan bumble bee. i still play with it here and there.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36330564)

but seriously, if my plan works out, i'm hoping my dotter will be proud of her old man.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36330643)

it's funny, i believe that just because i struggled, doesn't mean my kids have to but at the same time, they can use some reality like the kid in your story...

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36330666)

180 one of the best dudes on this board

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#40712552)

not much different than our adulthood I suppose

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36328684)

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sm11C8l9Xwk

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36328624)

https://twitter.com/luca_dollar/status/1012055651953119238

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36328651)

https://twitter.com/steffanym13/status/1012208188891025410

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36328665)

but the trade off is that you have a community where people shop together and where the middle and working class can have jobs.

Amazon has really been a disaster, even more than online shopping by individual retailers.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36328755)

See this photo of him supporting the "giraffe power" agenda?

http://www.syfy.com/sites/syfy/files/styles/1200x680/public/2018/03/geoffrey_giraffe_childrens_bargain_town.jpg?itok=heDC_JVt

That whole campaign photo is sickening -- exclusively giraffes, with not a hippo or orangutan body anywhere to be seen.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36328826)

:(

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36329307)

Libs, take note.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36329865)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGdZRKLaDcU

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36329349)

http://ivy.paheal.net/_images/76bce3f5417e46a031811a0429167380/2603519%20-%20Redrum%20Toys_R_Us%20geoffrey%20mascots.jpg

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4012954&forum_id=2#36329565)