December 28, 2007
Shopkeepers are saints during the holidays, and let us just say that a lot of the rest of us are not.
The week before Christmas I was in a line at a customer service desk in an upscale department store. I wanted a gift certificate; the woman ahead of me wanted to yell at the clerk. Apparently, she was picking up some wrapped gifts and did not like the color of the wrap and the ribbon. After shouting that she wanted gold wrap and white ribbon, not green with gold, the poor clerk offered to rewrap all 700 of her gifts.
Well, she did not actually have 700 gifts, but it must have seemed like that to him.
When I waited in line on Dec. 26 th at a sports store to return a Christmas gift, I heard customers ahead of me offer lame yet creative excuses as to why they had no receipt or why they wanted to return damaged items. Actually, it was quite entertaining to hear how the washing machine tore a shirt or the cat ate a sock.
I do not have any trouble believing either of these explanations.
However, the following one caused me pause.
The worst excuse I heard, and I hope it is not true, came from a couple that claimed they had to return their son's football jersey because he was in jail. The couple did not explain how they lost their receipt and who knows what the jail excuse had to do with the jersey.
Voices were loud now and customers were noticing the commotion. Something had to be done so the frustrated clerk called the manager.
To make a very noisy story short, the manager gave the couple cash even though the sign above the counter clearly said, "Return receipt required."
As I waited for my turn, the clerk mentioned to the manager that the jersey smelled like smoke and that it had no tags. The manager said with resignation, "Yes, I know, and did you notice the stitching on the back. We don't carry any jerseys here like that one any way."
Without mentioning any of this to the perpetrators, he kindly accepted the suspect goods with a smile.
It is snowing now; just days after Christmas, and the shopkeepers must deal with messy floors and tracked-in slush in addition to the still cranky after-Christmas bargain hunters. The bad weather only makes moods worse.
On such a snowy day I saw a man stomp his work boots before he entered a department store so as not to track in the mess of snow, sand, and street salt.
A woman behind him saw him, too, and began stomping snow from her shoes.
A chain reaction of thoughtfulness soon began as one after another shopper did the same.
Saints among us. They probably did not yell at the clerks either.
I stomped my boots clean and smiled.
