Tis the Season...

Sometimes I take joy in things I really shouldn’t.

Like today…

I ran to Walgreens to pick up a few things, as I was checking out, I was listening to the checkout lady get attacked by a person on the phone complaining about their photo order. I understand the person’s frustration, I'm still waiting on a photo order, but it isn’t the checkout lady’s fault. But what gave me joy was the checkout lady finally says, in a very kind tone, “I don’t know if they are ready, you said they were. If you want to see if they are ready, you will have to take your chances and come up here and see. Good day.” She then hung up and rang up my purchase.

It made me happy to see her remain “nice” but stand up for herself and go about helping other customers (we were all a bit shocked by the phone person).

But since this wasn’t enough Holiday cheer, when I walked out to my car the person parked next to me had put their cart between their car and my driver side. I'm not going to lie; my first thought was not a nice one. The person was still in the car, and the way it was positioned I had to move it to get into my car, so I decided to return the cart.

I returned the cart for two reasons: one, I thought it was the elderly lady and its cold; two because I was left with no choice but to return it. I could go on a very long rant about all the other places the cart could have been left, all of which meant I could have gotten into my car, but no one cares to read that.

So I waddle the cart back into Walgreens and as I come out I see the person finally leaving, so they weren’t in a huge rush. We met eyes and I saw that it was not the elderly lady; it was a young fit woman. I would have thought another nasty thought, but the look on her face was enough. She realized that by leaving the cart there she made a fat, pregnant lady waddle the cart back while she sat in her car on the phone.

Like I said I take joy in things I shouldn’t. It is wrong of me to judge and I should have just happily returned the cart and thought the best about the person who left it.

But I think the reason it got to me like it did, was its Christmas. It’s the one time of year where people are generally nicer than the rest of the year. But we are so caught up in material things and ourselves that we don’t think about others. So now I am reflecting on the joy these events brought me and how I am just as bad, if not worse, than the two people I thought were “bad” people.