Aliens

Talk about wandering onto another planet. The other day I was doing my weekly stop at the local Trader Joe’s – which, yes, can be another planet - and when I got to the register I was met by an alien working at the register. It sort of resembled a twenty-something year old man but only sort of. It was tall and stocky and it had a shaved head. The entire head – and the face and the throat and the forearms and the hands – every exposed bit of flesh - was completely covered with tiny flower tattoos. The nails on the hands were painted dark red. And let’s not forget the ears. The ear lobes were stretched wide to hold large, round white plugs.

I blinked. I blinked twice.

The alien looked at me. Seventy-two-year-old, clean shaven, grey haired me. He smiled. “Hey, how are ya today?” Yes, it would seem the alien spoke English.

“”Fine,” I said. “Thank you.”

I watched as he began to uber-efficiently run my purchases across the register screen. I looked around. Was it my imagination or were there now aliens everywhere? I saw purple hair and pink hair and blue streaked hair floating above yoga leotards. I saw nose rings hanging from the middle of nostrils. I saw beards that looked like avalanches. I saw tattoos, tattoos and more tattoos of different sizes, different shapes, different colors. I saw layered clothes and loose clothes and tight clothes and mismatched clothes – or maybe they were space suits – on skinny bodies, fat bodies, short bodies, old bodies. Was that Albert Einstein standing over there waiting in line? Was that a female Andre the Giant standing behind him? I tried to assure myself this was all completely normal and I was still on planet Earth. It wasn’t easy.

Maybe it’s me who’s an alien from another planet.