December 27, 2017       Patience  - Waiting without complaint

         I had more than a few opportunities to wait without complaint, or be patient in my Christmas shopping.  And, on two separate occasions the same incident happened, almost word for word.

         A young woman coming off shift in a grocery store, still in uniform from the morning shift, is checking out in front of me in the grocery line.  She is rushing, she is short of money and now has to put some things back and she looks up in her frazzled life and apologizes to me.

         “I am so sorry, I am holding up the line.”  She says, as she is figuring out what to do next, take this or that out of the grocery group to reduce the bill in order to be able to pay.

         Me, I’m basically daydreaming and casually watching all her actions as she pulled some things obviously meant for her children and had them removed from her grocery bill.  Next, she looked at her watch and out loud mentioned to no one in particular – maybe to herself or her guardian angel,

         “Oh, I am going to be late to my second job.”

         The cashier is a friend as well as a co-work of hers and tells her she will have plenty of time. 

         Now, the young woman is packing her own groceries to hurry things up and she drops something that falls on the floor and rolls and the cashier and her scramble to get it.

         “I am so sorry I am taking so long.”  She looked up at me.

         I was calm, patient, not perturbed. I had great empathy for this gal – this mom trying to be “superwoman” and doing it all.

         “Not a problem. I’ve all the time in the world, I’m retired now.”  I smiled at her.

         Just then the cashier said,

         “That’s the 4^th of 5^th time I’ve heard that in the last few days – I can’t wait for retirement – It must be great.”

         I smiled and nodded. I turned to see who was behind me to see if they were impatient and as soon as I made eye contact with the man and his wife, he said,

         “We are retired too, we’ve lots of time,” He called past me to the young woman packing her groceries.

         “Oh, you are all so nice.”  She said as she finally got her last bit of groceries in a bag and into her cart.

         It was my turn being cashed out now and I turned and smiled at the couple behind me.  This time the wife spoke.

         “Yes, retirement is wonderful, we don’t have to rush anywhere, we can go grocery shopping in the middle of the day, avoid the traffic.”

         “It has its advantages, doesn’t it?”  I concluded with a smile.

         “Yes, it does,” Sounded the man.

         A couple of days later, I was in a discount chain store and a Mom and Dad and three kids in tow were at the checkout.  I chose this line because there were only two in front of me compared to the 4 to 6 in other lines.  Their shopping cart was overflowing, the kids were getting restless and Dad was calling them down.

         Halfway through the checkout something didn’t seem to have a price on it.  I thought everything had a UPC code on it these days – but the cashier called his supervisor.

         The Mom turned to me and said,

         “I am so sorry for the delay.”

         “Not to worry, I am retired, now.” I said, and after I said it, I had a déjá vu moment and I realized I’d said the same thing a few days earlier.  I turned to see who was behind me and a white-haired lady smiled and said,

         “Don’t worry, I am retired too, take all the time you need.”  She leaned forward so that the Mom in front of me could see and hear her.

         The Mom’s face brightened and at that moment, she had to rein in one of her children.

         So, I found patience was abounding this Christmas season.  I hope you did too. Maybe more people recalled their Christian virtues because more people were calling out the Non-PC phrase Merry Christmas and actually meant what they were saying.