Yesterday was my first day at Bi Lo. It was actually pretty easy. I only worked a six hour shift, but even with that I already have a story to tell...
I was bagging since it was slow. This lady was checking out, she had two big bags of dog food, a small bag of cat food, some little cans of dog food and some "people" food.
"Put all that in one sack." She sounded nice enough.
"Do you want me to put the cat food in the same bag as well?" I asked, trying to make sure I was doing what she wanted.
"Um, I don't want to repeat myself again" She said very rudely. "That is animal food, and that is people food" So, she doesn't want her animal food and people food mixed, okay. I thought as I started to fix my mistake.
The checker started to scan some turkey lunch meat.
"That's dog food" She said rudely.
The checker started to argue. "What do you mean? This isn't dog food."
"Ugh, I'm not going to repeat myself a third time." She replied.
"I'm just trying to understand what you are saying." The checker said.
"I'm trying to tell to the young lady how to sack it." The lady said.
"Okay." The checker said, giving up.
After everything was sacked, the lady finished paying. I pushed the cart with her groceries out to her car. She walked at a decent pace so I was still able to keep up. But once she got to her car I had to go past her car to get the cart off the side walk since the sidewalk had a drop off.
"Uh ma'am, my car is over here." She said like I was stupid.
"Yes, I know. I can't go off that way, there's a drop off." I said nicely.
"Oh, okay." She said embarrassed that she said something.
There's the thing, that lady had no right to speak to me or the checker as rudely as she did. I know this is hard to believe, but I'm not a mind reader. Just because someone doesn't understand you doesn't give you the right to speak rudely, or disrespect them.
I was trying to understand, but it makes it hard when someone is acting that way towards me. Like I'm stupid just because I don't understand you, that just makes me human.
I know I really have a problem with this, I get so frustrated when
someone doesn't understand what I'm trying to say. This was something I
needed to realize yesterday. It definitely feels different when the
tables are turned.
So, next time you're trying to explain something to someone don't belittle them, or treat them rudely just because they can't understand you. Try speaking with kindness, just like you want spoken too.
09-24-2015
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