jedusor | Security

As I was cart-wrangling this evening around 9:45, a group of about eight young people in two cars pulled into the Price Chopper parking lot. They started blasting music, talking and laughing loudly, pushing each other around in shopping carts, and climbing on top of cars. I'm all about partying, but I also have work responsibilities, so I alerted the security guard on duty. He's new; I don't even know his name.

He ambled over to them with a cigarette in his hand and chatted with them for about five minutes, after which they cheerfully got back into their cars and left. I heard one of them call "Sounds good!" to the guard. I asked him what he'd said, and he told me that they'd been talking about car surfing, and he'd related to them his own experiences of motorcycle surfing on the highway. I don't know what else he said, but that's not important. The important part is that he talked to them, listened to them, identified with them, and solved the problem.

I'm really impressed. I wish all authority figures worked like that.