The Rainbow Connection  

Posted by Jonathan E Johns in , , ,

So it's Sunday night, I missed two of the last seven 'blog every day' posts. FAIL.

But I have a short list of things I couldn't actually fill an entire blog entry with, so I thought I would start the Sunday Week-end round up, and fill it with small stuff.

I had a customer come through the drive thru this past week, a woman driving, with a male passenger. So far, pretty normal. They knew what they wanted, right away, a Four-Pack of Natural Light Beer in cans, and a Fifth of CHEAP-assed vodka. Again, this is very normal. It was about 10:15 am, and I gathered the requested items. It took them a few minutes to decide which Cigarettes they each wanted, the man got a box of KOOL filter kings, and the woman finally decided on Marlboro light 100's. Again, nothing really unusual at this time has occurred.

After I gather all the goods, and give them the total bill, I ask if there is anything else at all I can get for them. They look at each other, and say something I cannot hear, and she says that they are going to get some scratcher tickets. Lottery tickets are pretty popular, and our store has about 40 different choices. She asks what we have for two dollar tickets, and I tell her I have about 10 different ones, she asks to see them, and I gather ten different tickets, and she ends up picking three of them. Then she asks about five dollar tockets, and it is about the same result, but she consults with the man in passenger seat, and they discuss the 'Bingo' Lottery card, versus the 'Crossword' bingo card.

Finally they decide what all they want, and pay up, and as I am handing out the change from their purchase, the woman is turned around completely digging in the back seat for something, so the man in the passenger seat reaches over her to get the change, and smiles up at me, and says thanks.

Which is when I noticed his right hand was wrapped in a very filthy rag, like something out of a car repair shop. And there was blood all over it. And his face was very pale. I inquired as to if he was okay. He said he'll be fine as soon as they get to the hospital, and get the stitches in.

Another thing about where I work, and this has happened in other places I have worked, I replaced someone. So the customers who come in ask about where the girl is that used to work here. I say I am not sure, I just got hired. Truth is, I was never told about the former employees, I don;t know if they died, were fired, quit, or were abducted by aliens. But everyone seems to wonder where they went, and wishes that this store would stop changing employees.

Well that leads me to my deep thought about employees, and I have had this thought for a long time. I thought when I was younger that it was just a small town thing, but it occurred in California in major metropolitan areas as well. People want to visit their favorite businesses, and have the same clerks serve them, for, like, ever. They sincerely try to care about them as well, I feel a sense of sincerity when people ask me about the girl I replaced, “How is she?” “Where is she?” “Tell her I asked about her”

The thing is, why would anyone who truly cared about someone like a clerk in a retail business honestly believe that these people would work in a business for years and years at such a low wage? Don't you think they might have higher aspirations? Don't you think they want more out of life than to serve you day in and day out for years and years at a quarter an hour raise per year? And beyond all that, how does it make me feel when you don't give a rats pancreas about me? I guess it is personal thing, I personally don't care if the clerk behind the counter is the same one every week I show up, or every day for that matter. I do care if the management changes, or the ownership, because I know that that will affect my experience at the business, but the clerks? I hope they do move on! If they have any ambition, they'll get the hell out of the clerking business, because there is no future in it. Maybe it is because I am sick of serving. Maybe it is because the 10 people out of 100 that I serve that are nice to me don't make up for the 90 that treat me like a doormat.

I wrote on a forum I visit daily, where there were a lot of arguments back and forth about the election, and the candidates, that those of us who are decided should just ignore the national politics this week, and spend more time looking hard at the local candidates. I wrote that I believe that the majority of governing should come from the floors of the House and Senate, and we should give more of our time talking about the issues that will really affect us in the next two years, rather than fret and argue about the executive branch. I don't think that either candidate has the where with all to continue the domineering executive branch that Bush has ran over the last 8 years, so there is a good chance that the Congress will have back some of the power it should have after the election.

I also mentioned that our fretting about extreme possibilities is wasted time. Over the last 8 years, there have been many years that the Republicans have held a majority in Congress, the Executive branch, and have put in place very conservative supreme court justices, yet Roe V Wade has still not been overturned, and Automatic weapons are not handed out in wal-mart, and gay marriage is still not banned. If a political party with as much power as the republicans have had have not riveted their planks down while they held the power to do so, chances are neither party will ever be able to swing to the extremes people are fretting about. Obama is not going to turn America into a Socialist state, and McCain is not going to turn it into a Fascist state.

This kind of extreme dialogue does nothing except divide our country, and provides neither side with anything but polarization. And I think that is what a minority of citizens want. I want a re-unified country, who does for their country what it needs us to do. Not just pay our taxes, and take what is available to us. We are the country, we are the government, and we owe it to each other to work hard to make it work, and to make our representatives know how we feel about the issues.

I read about a year ago or so that when a particular issue was up for debate in congress that our local representative got literally' hundreds' of letters and e-mails of citizens she represents sharing their thoughts on the issue. I think she represents many more thousands of people, so I wondered why more didn't just type an e-mail and share what they wanted from their elected representative. It is as if we are hiring lawyers, and then not speaking to them during the pre-trial phase, the hearings, the jury selection, or during the presentation of evidence, then all of a sudden, right before they stand up to give closing arguments, we put demands on them, ask what they have done for us over the last two years, and what are they going to do for us now? I think we need to participate more in the operations of our government, maybe then we wouldn't be so surprised when after eight years of no regulation, the markets take a huge crap, and leave us holding the bag. It is and was our responsibility to know this stuff. We are the government.

Heres some funny videos.





This entry was posted on Sunday, October 26, 2008 at 9:20 PM and is filed under , , , . You can follow any responses to this entry through the comments feed .

1 comments

i have a guess relating to the first half of your post. people nowadays (there i go sounding old again) are different than in the olden days. we used to know our neighbors, and spend time with them. we used to have friends and a social life--invite people over for drinks and such. now we are simply too busy--we spend all our time at a job we hate, trying to make ends meet, or on the road commuting to said job, or medicating with television and bad food, and have no time left for social interaction any more. this means making a connection with someone--ANYONE--on even a semi-regular basis is important on a level we don't recognize. sad, but true. guess i'll have to write more on my own page...getting a little long winded here.

November 3, 2008 at 11:54 AM

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