Hey. Well, yesterday something happened to me that made me think. I thought about it for a whole ten minutes after it happened (which, in today's world, is a hefty block of time to be just thinking about one thing), and then for an undisclosed amount of minutes later on! Yeah, really a lot of thinking! I work at a bank as a teller. They always tell us that we're the front line, the face of the bank to the customers. Wow, what an honor. When I hear that I wonder what the "front line" people in other lines of business get paid in comparison to those not on the front line. The ratio is probably more or less consistent all across the board, actually; front-liners are a dime a dozen. Just hire up the starving college students and throw them at the none-the-wiser patron. Ah, to be upper management...
Anyways, I was starting to tell about this old man who came into the bank, who comes into the bank every day. He usually purchases between two and seven money orders each day, in seemingly arbitrary amounts. I assume they are used to fend off bill collectors. Seems to me to be an awful lot of bills, but whatever. Yesterday he came up to my window and no sooner had he groaned to a halt than he was in rapid-fire mode. Apparently he had a discrepancy in the balancing of his check register, and we (the bank - when you work for a company, you are always the company, and occupy the same pronoun as the company, and are not individual from the company, especially when there are accusations to be made, regardless of how long you've worked there, or of your involvement in the incident in questions), yes, we had gotten the balance in his account wrong. So I rephrased his concern back to him, in what I thought to be an indication that I was doing my utmost to be sure that I understood his concern. I felt that this would help him feel that I was really going to help him with a solution to fit his need. Also, I was pretty unclear as to what the real problem was, due to his swarthy, hard-to-follow narrative, so I had to make sure I got it right for both our sakes. To my surprise, he got upset.
He said, "Now hold on! I'm asking the questions here, and it's your job to answer them. Don't just spout facts at me!" Thus began a little exchange in which he consistently treated me like I was basically an idiot. As I tried again to tell him what I was going to do to fix his problem as I understood it, he said, "No, hold on! Let me finish asking a question, and then you can talk. That's how it normally works." Our eyes locked. I could feel something coming, I could feel air being pushed up my throat, air that would meet the words my brain was thinking somewhere behind my nose and carry them out of my mouth. The words that I probably should not have said, but they were already there, so... I said, "Okay! Let's have a normal conversation, then. I'm listening." Yep. And he caught on. Yep. "Hey, take it easy, boy!" That's what he said. He called me boy. He was mad, and I guess rightly so, because I had been a smart-aleck. There you go.
This event made me think about how much and at the same time how little generation gaps matter. What etiquette am I, as someone in my twenties, required to follow when interacting with someone in their late sixties or beyond? Is there an etiquette? And if so, should there be? And what should it be? I agree that those who have lived long lives have done much to shape the world in which we now live. And I mean that in a good way, I am not a pessimist. I mean that I understand that there are people who have fought in wars, engaged in politics, engineered new technologies, and made all kinds of other efforts to make their future, our present, brighter and better for those who come after them. And I appreciate that immensely. But does all that, as meaningful and essential as it is, exempt them from common courtesy? Am I to feel like this man is my equal as another human with all the same rights and liberties as I have, or that he is my superior because he has lived longer and done more? I feel I owe those who are more advanced in years and experience my respect, in general. But how much respect do I owe someone who is treating me like I am not only thick in the head, but also intentionally rude and difficult? Goodness, what a conundrum. I want to be kind and respectful to people, and I almost always am, from what I can tell (of course I think I always am), but do I owe that to anybody? Or is it just something that I should do because I am compelled to do it? I think the latter.
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