honest mistakes

when i was still young enough
to attend a secondary school
i had a part-time job
down the street from my home
pumping gasoline into automobiles
at some russian-owned discount bar
whose name escapes me at the moment
i managed to get a few friends hired
which made it that much more tolerable
we'd smoke pot and play hacky sack in between cars
one day a disheveled trucker pulled in
he told me to fill 'er up with diesel fuel
trucks like that have big honking metal gas caps
not the little dinky plastic-types you see in cars
it takes several counterclockwise motions to open 'em
i did what was asked of me while he smoked a cigarette
as i was making clockwise motions to seal the deal
he yelled out, hey idiot - which tank did you fill?
what do you mean? i asked
that's the hydraulic fuel tank, you fucking moron! that's going to cost thousands of dollars to fix, my boss is going to kill me
to this day, i'm not sure if the tank was smoking
or if the driver was actually fuming at the ears
that sucks, dude. sorry - honest mistake, was all i could manage
and there i was, thinking that i'd already
heard all the swear words that there was to hear