People are in too much of a hurry these days.
The other night Mariel and I were at Target buying some stuff for the dorm. We were waiting in line to pay and there was a woman in front of us who decided to pay for her purchases with a check, which is, I might add, a notoriously slow method to pay in the first place. In any case, the cashier, who was new, I assume, went through the routine of getting the woman’s driver’s license number and proceeded to enter it into the register. Now I wouldn’t know this for sure, coming from New Mexico, but apparently California driver’s license numbers begin with a letter. The cashier tried entering just the numerical part, which I think it not an unreasonable thing to do. She tried several times, unsuccessfully, and she finally asked another cashier for help. At this point, I think about 4 minutes had passed, tops. However, the woman was visibly annoyed and in a very loud voice tried to tell the cashier what to do, even when the other cashier was helping her out. The cashier eventually entered in the number correctly after another thirty seconds or so. At that point, the woman was fuming and grabbed her purchases and said something about not needing a receipt, all the while sounding extremely annoyed. I thought to myself, you know what, lady? What is happening in your life that makes those past four and a half minutes so precious that you can be so rude to the people around you? I really don’t think that you, Ms. Overweight Housewife, were really on your way to do life-saving heart surgery where four and a half minutes might actually make a difference. Now as a general rule, I try to be nice cashiers, but I felt like I should be extra nice to this one to make up for the woman in front of me, who apparently missed the birth of her first child in that four and a half minutes, judging by the way she was treating this cashier.
Let me put it this way: last week 6,000 people died and you and I didn’t. Life is pretty damn good. Maybe you should slow down and enjoy it for once.
Tags: 9/11
