Free Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim by David Sedaris

cashier came out, fluttering his hands as if they were whisk brooms. “We can’t have you hassling the customers,” he said. “Go on, now. Scoot.”
Hassle was a young person’s word, and coming from a full-grown man, it sounded goofy, reminding me of the way movie cowboys used the word amigo. I wanted the hippie to stand up for himself, to say, “Cool it, Baldie,” or “Who’s hassling who?” but instead he just shrugged. It was almost elegant, the way he picked himself up off the ground and crossed the parking lot to what was most likely his parents’ car. It didn’t matter that he probably lived at home, criticizing the system during the day and sleeping each night in a comfortable bed. He’d maybe put my quarters toward some luxury — incense maybe, or guitar strings — but that was no big deal, either. He was a grown-up’s worst nightmare, and, minus the hat, I wanted to be just like him.
At that point in my life I was still receiving an allowance, three dollars a week, which I supplemented with babysitting and an occasional job at the Dorton Arena, a concert and exhibit hall located on the state fairgrounds. When we were lucky, my friend Dan and I wore white jackets and folding paper hats and worked the concessions counter. When, far more frequently, we were unlucky, we wore the same dopey outfits, hung heavy trays around our necks, and marched up and down the aisles, selling popcorn, peanuts, and the watered-down Cokes we were instructed to refer to as “ice-cold drinks.”
In real life nobody said things like “ice-cold drinks,” but our boss, Jerry, insisted on it. Worse than simply saying it, we had to shout it, which made me feel like a peddler or an old-time paperboy. During heavy-metal concerts we went unnoticed, but at the country-music shows — jamborees, they were called — people tended to complain when we barked through their favorite songs. “Stand by Your POPCORN, PEANUTS, ICE-COLD DRINKS,” “My Woman, My Woman, My POPCORN, PEANUTS, ICE-COLD DRINKS!” “Folsom Prison POPCORN, PEANUTS, ICE-COLD DRINKS.” The angrier fans stormed downstairs to take it up with Jerry, who said, “Tough tittie. I got a business to run.” He dismissed the complainers as “a bunch of tightwadded rednecks,” which surprised me, as he was something of a redneck himself. The expression tightwadded was a pretty good indicator, as was his crew cut and the asthma inhaler he’d decorated with a tiny American flag.
“Maybe he means 'redneck' in an affectionate way,” my mother said, but I didn’t buy it. Far more likely he saw a difference between himself and the people who looked and acted just like him. I did this as well, and listening to Jerry made me realize how pathetic it sounded. Who was I to call someone uncool — me with the braces and thick black-framed glasses. “Oh, you look fine,” my mother would say. She meant to reassure me, but looking fine to your mother meant that something was definitely wrong. I wanted to turn her stomach, but for the time being my hands were tied. According to the rules, I wasn’t allowed to grow my hair out until I turned sixteen, the same age at which my sisters could finally pierce their ears. To my parents this made sense, but ears were pierced in a matter of minutes, while it took years to cultivate a decent ponytail. As it was, it would take me a good nine months just to catch up with Dan, whose mother was reasonable and did not hamper his style with senseless age restrictions. His hair was thick and straight and parted in the middle, the honey-colored hanks pushed behind his ears and falling to his shoulders like a set of well-hung curtains.
Ever since the fourth grade we had been mutual outcasts — the nature lovers, the spazzes — but with his new look Dan was pulling ahead, meeting cool people at his private school and going to their homes to listen to records. Now when I called somebody an L7 he looked at me the way that I had looked at Jerry —