prisoner of customer service

at my job i am supposed to be nice and helpful. polite. tactful. placid. generally vanilla when it comes to conflict. i should probably embrace a WASP-like persona of "oh, isn't that wonderful" on a daily basis... that is, if one were to believe that i'm likely to follow the rules. ha! you know me better than that, don't you?

in defense of my spiky behavior, there is only so far that i can be pushed, even when i'm feeling generously polite, before i snap and push right back. if you're just having a bad day and being a little cranky i'll probably go ahead and cut you a little slack, so long as you're not taking it out directly on me for no reason. if you feel the need to try and impose your stupidity on me it is another matter entirely. yes, i will be the one who does actually say those things i'm not supposed to say. it's not in my job description to provide excellent service at the expense of my own fucking soul.

EXAMPLE ONE - a black man was in this week (the fact that he's black will be important as i go on) and being very rude. more than rude. he was being an outright racist to me. he addressed me at one point as "girl" and then started in on phrases like "you people" in further attempts to condescend me. when asked if i was offended, i told him that i didn't have time for stupid stuff like that when it comes to ignorance. "what? what do you mean by that?" he said. "that's the kind of thing you people have said to blacks for years! why are you looking at me like that?" that's when i said, "because you're being a racist, sir." after his dissertation on how hispanics don't count as brown people because they don't know what it's really like and how he didn't understand why the mother of a mulatto child got offended when he said "hey, you people sure do make beautiful babies" ended, i told him what was what. well, maybe he was just pushing to see if i would take it. maybe no one had ever told him he was a jackass. maybe he thought that no one would have the nerve to call a black man a racist out in public. whatever it was, he straightened up and acted right after that. by the end of it all, he was polite and we were friendly to one another. some people just need a firm hand.

EXAMPLE TWO - a middle aged professional kept pestering me about the movie "what the bleep do we know?" when asked if i liked it, i told her that i'd fallen asleep and just didn't get it. well, according to her i needed to watch it again until i understood it. my problem, she told me, was that i hadn't appreciated it enough, that i needed to see it after i got high. to this i replied, "i don't do drugs because they're boring. drugs are for losers." she shut up immediately and promptly wandered off in shame. good. leave me the fuck alone with that shit.

EXAMPLE THREE - an old grumpy man was in a few weeks ago and felt the need to complain for over ten minutes about the service in retail. HE was a retired salesman who knew what he was doing, so HE was the authority on service. HE knew what it meant to be a good christian, and oh by the way are you a christian too? no i'm not, sir, thank you. the conversation then degenerated into what muslims think, with him saying "i don't know how YOU feel about blah blah" in a way that implied i am a muslim. how did it get to be one or the other??!?! in my way, i tried to be tactful in describing some bible stories as mythology, which is when he told me that it was all true. "even that ark thing and the flood?" i asked. "oh yes, everything in the bible is true and you should know that by now." what the fuck? that's all i can say on that guy. what the fuck?

EXAMPLE FOUR - i have become the new sweetheart of one of our more regular and more difficult customers. he's elusive. he's grumpy. he's a pain in the ass. he thinks i'm the only one who can fix his problems. i got three separate earfuls yesterday over the phone. he even reamed a coworker for the fact that i was at lunch one of the times he called. even though it "wasn't completely her fault" that he had a problem, he told her that it wasn't his job to know when i went to lunch. this was after he'd told me that it wasn't his job to give us his credit card number, because that's what were there for... to keep his charges organized. really, i'm not shitting you here when i tell you he thinks that we (or me, more to the point since he's latched on to me) should keep track of all the business he does no matter what else we have to do at work. after i finally got things smoothed over, he seemed less unhappy than usual, but now he asks specifically for me when he calls. oh how i miss being seen as an idiot.

EXAMPLE FIVE - i am sick of being told what exactly IS my fault when it's simply a decision that is out of my control. i'm the sort that will bend as many rules to a snapping point as possible, all to work in your favor. if you have some manners and decency, there isn't a thing i won't do for you. however, it IS NOT my fault that you're in a hurry and running late. it IS NOT my fault that buying more shit is expensive. it IS NOT my fault that it's raining in seattle. it IS NOT my fault that you credit card got declined. it IS NOT my fault that you want to push your personal beliefs on me and then can't be prepared for the fact that i might not agree with you. it IS DEFINITELY NOT my fault that you have no fucking sense of compassion or humor and can't pull your head out long enough to realize i'm a human being and not a personal slave.

okay, so that last one was a much more general bitching, but still an example of the regular havoc that goes on when i'm just trying to have good conduct. yes, it is called "the service industry" for a reason; that reason is not to imprison its employees into being random whipping boys and girls. if you want to commiserate about your bad day, i'm your girl. if you want to complain about someone who just bumped into you and didn't bother to apologize, that's fine. just don't load me up with your petty shit and then expect sunshine and smiles.

so i will do my best to be helpful, but you can also count on me to reflect your attitude like a mirror. if you think that i'm not going to push back against being abused just because i need a job, then think a-fucking-gain. being on the clock DOES NOT take away my right to get a little respect. my being in the building in no way makes me some submissive ninny who is going to take your shit. if you have problems, get a fucking counselor and deal with it. the middle of a simple transaction is not the place to resolve your issues.

whew. i needed that.


something fun i did this week:
saw a live burlesque show!