Appreciation

there's a woman, in town, that lisa and i have dubbed "Appreciation".

make no mistake, we were frustrated to extremes with her, at first. i suspect that everyone crossing her path is. she has trouble making sense. she asks you how much everything is, all at once. she gets frustrated, and thinks you're slow, when you don't know everything all at once. she is condecending.. even though you know that you're not the one who might be lacking of a few marbles. she lets you run everything through, and then she says, "Oh, that's too much, that's too much... can you return these pads? (pause).. Yeah, my mother doesn't need them anymore." you take them off the bill, and she commences to request that 90% of the other things be returned, sometimes adding, "I just talked to my mother, she doesn't need these anymore," after the pause. it's unnerving, especially to me, because *her mother* is never actually with her. lisa's seen the "mother", which eased my mind a little bit.

but she's nice. for all her craziness, she's very sweet. she knows, in some way, that she's a pain in the ass. she's concerned that she's taking up too much time (yes, she's always taking up too much time.. not that lisa or i would ever let her know that). she's grateful, in her own way. very grateful. lisa's theory is that she was taught, some time ago, to show appreciation. so that's what she does.

i'm nice to her, because i worry that other people aren't. i see the looks she gets, sometimes, from the customers in line behind her. i won't lie, and say she doesn't get on my nerves, but if it's enough to get on MY nerves, i can only imagine how the other (not so friendly) cashiers treat her in town.

lisa's nice to her, because she's funny, and she knows she'll have a story to tell me, afterwards. she loves her, in a way, even though she's frustrating as all get-out. lisa's in it for the laughs, she knows that at the end of the transaction, she'll be saying, "Appreciation, appreciation." that's enough to make anyone with a sense of humor be more patient.