Line Of Questioning

Even though phones have become very handy at providing distractions when people find themselves with unanticipated time to kill, we still haven't gotten to the point in society where people like waiting in lines, which makes people's willingness to make Black Friday a legitimate event every Thanksgiving thoroughly confusing to me. Every other advancement we try and make when it comes to shopping, be it self-checkout or curbside delivery, was done with the idea of eliminating long waits and yet here are a group of people who get out of bed ridiculously early in the morning and are willing to stand in parking lots for the right to be in the middle of a brawl over a toy. The good news is that these maniacs are becoming increasingly rare, as the rest of us have figured out that there is no present in the world which can't be found online if you are willing to pay a little extra for it and since you can't put a price on sleep, that is the best deal for everyone involved. I actually think all these ways we have come up with to avoid waiting in lines has helped make us more patient people because you have to remember that people can only take so much before they snap. Constantly waiting in long lines will drive you crazy but when you only have to wait in a long line once a month or so you remember it used to be worse, are thankful those days are over, thank your lucky stars you live in a civilized world and the annoyance of waiting just rolls off your shoulders. That is also why when you find yourself in line you can always tell who has spent their entire day at the mercy of slow registers.

I was waiting to buy something in a store this afternoon and unfortunately the place was suffering from a severe lack of open registers. Making the back-up seem worse was the fact there was a register on each side of the check-out lanes, which means everyone was congregating in a couple spots. The manager was scrambling to open additional registers as quickly as possible but since I know that you have to balance the drawers out before you can open them, I assumed that by the time they were open I would already be out of the store. For the most part I was quite proud of my fellow shoppers who quickly adapted to the situation and formed one line at each lane and then whoever was next would bounce to the side which had the first open register. The line was moving steadily if not particularly quickly and soon enough I found myself next in line. I must have been leaning a little bit too much to my right because that was when a woman pushed her way past me on the left and went to the register on that side even though that woman hadn't finished being rung up. I thought that was a little rude, but considering the woman at the other register was just about done and the woman at the furthest register had mentioned she was going to be ordering something special (meaning she would take longer), I decided not to say anything. Besides, I figured I was still next in line at the register and since I was only buying a couple of items and I had exact change to do that I would be on my way soon enough. I was right as I was on my way out the door before the line-cutter even started to be rung up. I figured that was karmic justice and was content to go on with my day.

One of the women a couple people behind me was not quite as willing to let this transgression slide and began to loudly question to no one in particular if the one line was still supposed to be for both register. The problem was someone answered her in the affirmative, which gave her the confidence to keep up the questioning, only the next one was directed right at me, as she question why if I was next they would take that other woman first. Apparently she expect the people at the registers to ring people up and play traffic cop. I just shrugged my answer which sadly didn't cause her train of thought to suddenly be on the inside. After a couple more comments it was pretty obvious she was really airing her grievances at that one woman but trying to seem non-confrontational by hiding it through a series of loud, rhetorical questions. Meanwhile the woman who cut the line did the thing we all do when we purposely do something wrong but act like it was an accident, which is she was desperately trying to avoid eye contact with all the people behind her and act like she couldn't hear the woman talking loudly. Since the act of cutting people in line gets a stronger reaction the older the people waiting are you would think I would be on the side of the woman trying to shame the cutter. But in looking her over I decided to just let her have this one. She really looked like she needed a win - not just in the store but in life. Besides, I had a feeling I knew the real motives of the woman doing all the talking.

Let's be honest here - this woman wasn't upset with the line-cutter because she broke the sanctity of the line, she was mad because she felt like this woman was cutting her personally. She was doing one of my least-favorite things in life - trying to improve her own situation by acting like she was taking a stand against injustice for everyone. People who do this are one of the reasons I hate the 24-hour cable news networks, as no one on those channels are honest with their intentions. For example these newscasters, all of whom make six-figures a year, tell you that they think tax breaks for the wealthy are bad for America because it will stop job growth when the reality is they are against tax breaks because they don't want their own taxes to go up. I may not agree with using such a high pulpit to advance your own cause, but at least if they did that I would admit they were straightforward about it and I could respect their honesty. In my eyes this woman trying to paint herself as the voice of reason was being just as disingenuous. Even worse, she was trying to get me on her side by acting as if she was protecting my interests. Now, she happened to read me correctly in that even if I had a problem with the woman pushing her way passed me I wouldn't have said anything, but that was definitely an accident. She was trying to complain about what this woman did without actually saying the words and I was kind of glad no one else in line with her took the bait. There are some causes worth fighting for and this was no one of them. I can only imagine how much of a joy she would be to deal with at 4 AM the day after Thanksgiving.