This blog entry was hand-written on a touchscreen, 10-year-old Personal Data Assistant (remember PDAs?). My Casio BE-300 "Cassiopeia"--I actually own two of them--has handwriting recognition, plays movies and MP3s, and can view and/or edit office files, photos, etc. I purchased it originally so I could write wherever I was, and also so I could read ebooks.
Flash forward seven years, and PDAs are yesterday's tech. Netbooks--suddenly I needed one of those. So I got one, a Dell with a solid state drive so I wouldn't have to worry about vibrations killing the drive. (Heat and a design flaw did that after four months, causing my first and only drive failure in over two decades of computing.) I got my netbook cheap, since all of a sudden...
...tablets exploded onto the scene. And having spent my tech cash over the years on five desktops, one netbook, two PDAs, and more upgrades than I care to admit to, all I could do was run to the end of my fiscal chain and bark.
I felt I NEEDED an iPad, dammit. Whoops, make that an iPad 2. And an iPhone 3, er, 4...4s. No, wait, isn't 5 on the way?
Good god. What exactly is it I'm looking for? What slice of happiness and satisfaction is missing from my life that I imagine can be filled from electronic, external sources? When I really examine the issue, I have to admit that I'm deluding myself.
I've lots of company, though. Especially in December.
I turned on the 'net a few days ago to learn that, down in the States, some shopper went berserk and sprayed her peers with pepper spray--all in order to be first at a pallet of discounted e-goods. What kind of a person does this?
It's times like this when I remember my stint of working in retail. I did this for a decade one year, the time served stretched tenfold by the neuroses of the public. I was a $6 an hour clerk working for someone who still believed in the class system, trying to work the till with a cheery smile. The customers, for their part, had just realized that the Kincaid-painted, Matha Stewart world of Christmas perfection had once again somehow fallen beyond their grasp. ("I needed only 3 more transparent blue bulbs to fill that string on my eaves...and all they had left was SOLID blue. Can you believe it? Christmas is ruined!")
They responded as only an affluent, Christmas-crazed culture might: they decided that the holidays were a sham, the most horrible time of the year, and that it was All The Direct Fault of the Evil, Minimum-Waged Clerk Behind the Till. The resulting bitchy snarling and downright meanness that resulted was at once both sad and amusing.
I confess, I had fun with it, by turning the whole affair into a bizarre social experiment. Depending on my mood, I began to offer my services in one of two different modes: 1) Pleasant and friendly but kind of pokey, deliberate and slow, or 2) Pleasant and friendly but super fast and efficient. Predictably, the result of mode 1 was a long line of Christmas shoppers that didn't move so fast. Just as predicably, Mode 2 resulted in a much shorter queue with smaller waiting times.
Not surprisingly, the public's reaction to these two styles of service was very different indeed. What WAS surprising was what those reactions were:
Mode 1 customers, who got the slower, friendly service, showed signs of calming down. Even the grumpier ones seemed a little better when I got to them, even as I took my time ringing them up, as long as I continued to serve them politely. Mode 2 customers, on the other hand--the ones who got the fast and efficient, yet still-friendly service? Those poor souls lost their minds.
At first I thought I was imagining it, but the weight of evidence grew. I went faster and faster, still giving the same polite, friendly service. The line grew shorter, waiting times dropped...and those served grew angrier and angrier. By the time my assistant and I reached the maximum speed the computerized till could handle, customers were actually wiggling their fingers at the printer, tearing their almost-finished receipts right out of it in a rage, then storming out the door. Some, during their abbreviated wait, actually pulled out their mobiles to complain to absent companions about the ''excruciatingly slow'' pace of clerks who obviously wanted to wreck their day. At least they tried to; by the time they'd started their rant, it was their turn at the checkout. This only seemed to enrage them more.
Then we'd drop once more to the pace of a snail--and the smiles would return.
I took away from this experience a trio of different things, one negative and two constructive. First, I learned that most people in the world are nuts, completely and utterly bonkers. But I also learned, at this time of year, to recognize in myself the signs of holiday stress. When that panic rises within me, that feeling of needing to get it ALL done, I simply remind myself that I don't. Forgot to stock up on eggnog? A glass of juice will do. Christmas light display a tad less spectacular than last year's? The neighbours will get over it. Kids (or yourself) miss A Charlie Brown Christmas? It's on now on three other channels. I've proved it to myself time and again: if I just let the holidays flow on their own, not forcing anything in at all, I'll discover later that our flawed, incomplete Christmas was the best we've had so far.
Lastly, I've learned just a bit to be kind. I know what the clerks in the stores are going through. Even if they seem grumpy themselves, I know they have their reasons. If I'm kind to them anyway, they just might respond to me the same.
And that's what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.
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