I step out into the night. My working night is over and I'm carrying 3 dozen boxes of Krispy Kreme doughnuts matching my Krispy Kreme uniform. As I walk through the city the thought occurs that I barely know a dozen people let alone 3 dozen. Suddenly my working prize seems more a burden as I picture the walking and train trips ahead.
Powering through the lamp-lit streets I make a mission of giving out my doughnuts to whoever takes my fancy. I eye a street cleaner… ‘Will he get my doughnuts?’ I pass without him returning my intense gaze and he is now in the distance - I guess not! I feel sad I really wanted to give him some.
I pass business men, buskers and theatre goers and still three boxes remain in my weakening arms. I'm feeling rejected and slightly guilty about my desire to spread sweetness and joy to metropolitan Melbourne - what am I really doing? Who am I? According to folk at the party I just catered I’m an odd Irish lass here on a working holiday visa. I feel slightly nervous at how this conclusion was drawn – apparently it was my accent – I must be slurring my words again.
I pass a party of three - two men and a lady. A man wearing a striped shirt is looking intently at me. Does he want my doughnuts? He hasn’t grabbed the box out of my arms so he mustn’t. I smile and keep walking.
What to do what to do? I wait at a traffic light and pan the streetscape. No one seems interested.
‘Excuse me, excuse me,’ I see the striped shirt man running toward me. ‘Excuse me I was ah just wondering if um, if you knew anywhere around here which is nice for a quiet drink…I just thought you might know’ he stares at my top ‘you seem like you might know this area well, like you’re a local.’ Does he want me, or my doughnuts? I feel that odd Irish lass return…
I look around trying to get my head around the area and the quiet drink nightlife. ‘No I don’t um hmmm no I don’t know anywhere. I don’t even know where I am anymore. It’s got to that point you know, in the night when you’re tired I think and you well you don’t know where I don’t know what’s going on anywhere. I don’t even know’ I stop. ‘But you can have a box of doughnuts if you like!’ I push a box eagerly in his direction. He shakes his head disappointed.
‘Toot!!!Toot!!’ A car pulls up beside me. ‘Hello! Hello! Krispy Kreme! Krispy Kreme!!’ A hysterical woman leans out of her open window with that certain gleam I’ve been looking for radiating from her eyes. ‘Hello Hello Kripsy Kreme! Where did you…’
I know what she wants. I run up to the car toward the lucky receiver. I pass her one box through the window – she squeals with glee. Moved by the joy I give her another. The traffic light turns from red to green and she drives off screaming ‘Thankyou Krispy Kreme’. My heart feels warm – I have brought unimaginable, spontaneous happiness into a stranger’s life, not to mention her families, friends and workmates.
I walk back to the footpath feeling the hero. The striped shirt is waiting. ‘So you don’t know anywhere? Anywhere at all for a nice quiet drink?’
I shake my head. ‘And you don’t want any doughnuts?’ He shakes his. I shrug my shoulders - meaning to say I give up I can't help - and he reluctantly wanders back up the street.
I cross the street and survey the human life. What are they after? It’s all a lot simpler when they toot out and they’re just after your doughnuts.
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