The Online Photographer

Long ago I worked at a place called Johnson’s Flower Center in Washington D.C., located in a sprawling old one-story department store on Wisconsin Avenue near Van Ness Street, south of the National Cathedral and quite close to downtown. It's long since gone, torn down and replaced with a sleek multi-story modern building. Johnson's, named for its founder Ray Johnson Sr., was a complete flower shop, with five full-time flower arrangers and an army of kids selling bedding plants in the springtime, and a complete garden center as well, with a nursery with piles of bark mulch and fertilizer bags and heaps of pea gravel and so on. It had a whole department for pots and vases and containers, one for houseplants, yet another for lawn tools and books about plants and gardening, a greenhouse, even a small gift shop, the space for which I remodeled myself. They really had it made in that location, but some developer must have made them an offer they couldn't refuse. I can't even remember how long I worked there, but I started selling bedding plants in April—I believe that was 1980—so I was there at least until mid-February of the next year. When bedding season ended I finagled my way into staying by becoming the carpenter and handyman. I needed the paycheck. Probably stayed a year or two.

This is the only photo I could find online of the old Johnson's Flower Center in downtown D.C. I built all those A-frame bedding plant racks you can see under the awning.

On Valentine’s Days we would stay open an extra two hours. But the boss and the managers went home early, leaving three of us young goof-offs in charge. Business stayed brisk for a while, tailing off as it got later. For the stragglers, we had a special treat. We would lock the front door and stand inside it, pretending we were already closed. Young guys with sober expressions on their faces would come up, try the door, and their expressions would change to alarm and panic. I'd tap my watch and shake my head. We’d let them beg a little, then relent and let them in to buy a bouquet or an arrangement. The later they were, the more money they spent.

This was juvenile, but then, so were we; I was 23, and a drinker, and a joker. We thought it was pretty funny at the time. 

We were supposed to close at 7:00, but the three of us decided to stay an extra 20 minutes or so because of the fun we were having with it. Right at the end of that time, a taxicab screeched to the curb on Wisconsin Avenue, and a young guy in a nice suit leapt out of the cab, hopped over the chain you see in the picture, and came running to the door. As I said, I think this was not quite a month after Reagan's inauguration, so he might have been new in town to boot. All three of us were on the other side of the glass. He was so desperate and distraught we let him beg and plead for quite a while because it was so entertaining. He acted like he was begging for his life, and maybe he was! He even offered us $20 each if we’d let him in and sell him some flowers. Twenty dollars was a lot to us back then—I started that job at a wage of $1.90 an hour plus tips. We finally opened the door, of course. We didn’t take his $20 bills—the boss, Ray Johnson Jr., would not have approved of that. 

Well, if you never saw anyone so desperate, you also never saw anyone so grateful. Turned out he knew when we closed, but had gotten distracted calling all around town for restaurant reservations and lost track of time, and then the cab got slowed by rush-hour traffic. He thanked us profusely and over and over again. He’d somehow forgotten all about Valentine’s Day, and we got the distinct impression that that wasn’t going to go over too well that evening.

We never let on that he'd been the victim of a prank, and I doubt he ever knew. At least the poor guy's relationship probably survived the evening, though, because he got the dinner reservations and he got the two dozen red roses in the end. Or maybe it was three dozen, I don't recall. He was motivated, I'll say that!

Mike

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