Sadly, my labor day was filled with just that. Labor. This is an account of my extremely terrifying and eye-opening labor day.

I work in retail, so naturally I see the general public: the good, the bad and the ugly. I have regular customers who know me by name and know little tid-bits about my life and I welcome them warmly each time I see them. As a full-time student I work when I can and I work as many hours as I can. Yesterday, while I was laboring on Labor Day, a regular customer came in talking on his cell phone. This is a man who I've seen numerous times, I know his daughter that he brings in from time to time and I know his name. He comes in at least once a week and buys a handle of vodka. Yesterday was particularly different though. His telephone conversation rang an alarm in my head. It set off warning bells to stay away from him. As he walked around our quiet store he talked to a male friend about a very sensitive topic: Rohypnol, better known as roofies. This is a man in his 40's with a beautiful and funny daughter. His conversation went like this, "Yeah man, the roofies are no good when you can't get any action. There's no need to use roofies in Columbia The ratio of women to men is 2:1 so there's always going to be someone who wants to go home with you. Yeah man, I have some I can give to you."

He was not joking. His tone of voice, the look on his face told a story that I would have never known. Here I thought it was just another nice customer that would ask me about my day or crack a joke, but no. My vision of him changed so suddenly. I was terrified. Unfortunately, I am not one to keep my mouth shut, so when I heard him say these things out loud so proudly, I made eye-contact with my boss who saw my fear. I nodded to him and walked calmly to the warehouse to get away from the situation. My boss reinforced my decision to step away and took care of the man's transaction. My mind spun with the possibilities of what this man has already done and will do in the future. Is this man that I've encountered so many times a rapist? The very thought of being near him made my skin crawl. He left the store laughing because my manager asked him to watch what he was saying in public, to which he replied to his phone "Oh, I'm getting a lecture by the asshole in ___." He laughed and he laughed until he walked through the door.

I think it was safe to say after my shift was over I needed a drink.

It just so happened that one of my best friends had had a tough day too, so we met to go to one of my favorite restaurants in town. But when we sat down, we had no idea that we wouldn't be able to focus on our conversation.

We began with hellos, ordered a drink, and began talking to my favorite server about our crappy days. During our conversation there was a baby sitter behind us who was fussing. I don't mind the crying because I love children and understand that it isn't always easy to get the baby to settle down, so I continued speaking. When I was about half-way through my story I saw my friends eyes widen and look behind me. As I turned, I saw the man sitting across from the infant hit it. The child cried harder and screamed. He hit it again. He screamed profanity at it. Harsh, harsh profanity. It didn't understand. There's no way it could. I won't say what exactly he said because it hurt my heart too much. I excused myself from my friend and stepped outside to call the police. I dialed 9-1-1 and explained to the operator what was going on, where I was, what the man looked like, and just how small the baby was. The operator thanked me for calling and said an officer would be on their way. When I came back inside my friend told me that the man had held a knife up to the baby while I was outside. Of course after all of this had happened my appetite was gone. I tried to eat and carry on with normal conversation, asking my friend about her job and her day. But neither of us could focus. All I could hear was this man, talking to this infant like it was competent and grown. Saying that he was going to "smack the s*** out of it." All while the mother was holding it, saying nothing. We waited. After 25 min of waiting, the police still were not there and the couple demanded their check. I hoped their server would stall them until the officer got there, but she couldn't stall long enough. The couple left, with profanity and insanity following them out the door and still no police officer. 40 minutes went by from when I initially called and they were gone. Then the officer arrived. My favorite server gave the officer a copy of their receipt with his information on it, and I gave my information and my account of the situation. After that, my mind was fried. If someone has enough gaul to hit an infant child in public, what happens at home? And why did the mother sit by so quietly? Is she too being beaten? But the hardest question I thought, was will that baby survive?

My heart is still heavy today and I didn't sleep much last night. This labor day was one I will never ever forget but not for good reasons. The scariest realization I had was that these are people our world. If you passed them on the street you may never know that they were that way. You can never be too careful in what you do and who you associate with. There is too much evil in the world for anyone to be careless. Be brave. Be smart.