This is just great.
You thought you learned everything in kindergarten but you were never tested. The test comes later on in life. Are you a player?
Example: Me at a well-known company to pick up copies of a manuscript, I am visibly annoyed - this is my third trip to get what was promised yesterday. The anxious clerk, Miss Saucer-eyes, is obviously new to the herd behind the counter and doesn't know what to do with me or for me. The work is still not done, despite promises. Getting mad at her won't help.
"OK, I won't make any trouble," I say, "Just give me a really clever, off-the-wall creative excuse - the wildest thing you can think of. Make me laugh and I'll go away."
Miss Saucer-eyes is mute. This situation was not covered in training school last week. She whispers: "I'll speak to my manager."
Not a player.
Miss Saucer-eyes retreats to the back of the shop and consults with her manager, a high-energy, sharply-dressed woman. The manager marches briskly up to the counter, gives me a steely look, leans over the counter, and explains:
"Sir, you may not know this, but this store has been a front for the Irish Republican Army for years. We're supposed to be turning in our firearms, and it seems a bazooka is missing from the inventory. When we find the bazooka, things will get back to normal. If I were you, I wouldn't make any trouble - just come back tomorrow, OK?”
A player.
I'm so glad Gerard Van de Leun is back at American Digest and the white hole is now just a memory. Otherwise I would never have checked in on
Posted by Jill Fallon at February 17, 2006 5:17 PM | Permalink