Zendaya Shops Here

I know I took a hiatus from the blogging world; however, it is only because I am still busy looking for the perfect permanent placement in LA. Can we appreciate that alliteration for a second? On top of that, I have been apartment hunting since my lease is up in a quick few weeks. Basically, it has been stressful and the People of LA took a back seat during this ride.

Buuuuut, WE’RE BACK. Hopefully. In light of the negative energy that has been filling the world, the person in LA this blog is about will hopefully counter that. I want to raise the good vibrational energy in the Universe. This blog will be short and sweet with the hopes of remembering the good that still does exist during tough times. This one goes out to the very special, Ronnie*.

I met Ronnie at Target. When I first moved to North Hollywood, it was whirlwind few days. We were buying things for an apartment, trying to explore with my mom and best friend, while dealing with the pain of credit cards and the banks. Between the three of us, our credit cards were declined almost every purchase we went to make. Despite calling the fraud department many times to let them know about my move, the cards were continually declined.

We kept our optimism up and decided to go to Target to buy a few things for my new space. A couple hundred dollars later, naturally, our cards were declined. The poor cashier did not know what to do. We tried six different cards. SIX. All declined. It was embarrassing and frustrating. They saved the transaction and sent us to the manager, Ronnie.

Ronnie tried every option she could think of to help us get our cards to go through. She rang everything up again to see if splitting the cost would work. And it didn’t. She rang everything up a third time, and still, we had no luck. So the three of us, sat on our phones trying to connect with someone to get the transaction to be approved.

Meanwhile, Ronnie is standing behind the cash register with this giant smile and a glow in her eyes about someone new moving to LA. She was so excited to tell me where to go, what to do, and where I needed to eat. Ronnie went on and on about all these street names as I stood there with a blank face wanting to get out of Target as fast as possible. It was quite endearing of her and I felt bad for being so absent in the moment.

However, my favorite part was that she was raving about this specific Target. Eventually, it came up that Zendaya frequents that Target. Usually, I am one of those people that is like, “Okay let me just bend and snap to pick up that name you just dropped…” but this was pure innocence. Ronnie was genuinely thrilled about seeing Zendaya on occasion and loving her manager position. I could feel the great energy radiating from her.

Finally, our cards went through, and I left Target with a beaming excitement for the amazing people I know I am going to meet in this city. It was a subtle reminder to find the good and the light during all the chaos that may be happening. I wasn’t aware of this until after leaving the store, but thank you, Ronnie, for continuing to see gratitude in the little things each and every day.

*I have tried to recreate events, locales, and conversations from my memories of them. In order to maintain their anonymity in some instances I have changed the names of individuals and places, I may have changed some identifying characteristics and details such as physical properties, occupations and places of residence.

#TheWonderful