Job Complaints, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Billy Down the Well

Jan 30, 2008 - 13:38 PM PST

Generally, I don't like to complain about my job. [Full Disclosure: I have since moved on to warmer climes and greener pastures.] Don't confuse that to mean that I DON'T complain about my job, far from it; if I remember correctly, complaining about your job is specifically guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States as one of the inalienable rights of man. Life, Liberty, Pursuit of Happiness, Burdening Others with Your Own Problems. They're all there, just as Thomas Jefferson set them down. In fact, in an early draft, Jefferson's Constitutional marginalia refers to "that damnable Franklin and hif irritable bowel fyndrome ftinking up the entire room like fo much fulfur."

So, whining about the job is nothing new. In December of 1170, King Henry II asked "will no one rid me of this troublesome priest?" and in doing so, unintentionally commissioned the murder of his lifelong friend and protege, Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Becket. (Oddly enough, Peter O'Toole's 1964 contract killing of Richard Burton happened in much the same way.) Vice President Spiro Agnew, in an alliterative flood befitting Jesse Jackson, referred to the tenacious Watergate media as "nattering nabobs of negativism." He resigned in disgrace and gave birth to the phrase "to Spiro out of control." Currently, otherwise heroic American soldiers in Iraq have been heard to ungraciously mention "it smells like crap over here," and "I no longer have both legs." Patriots? I think NOT. Terrorist much, Private? Complaints like these have a long and dignified history here in the western world. As far as the Orient is concerned, I maintain a thoroughly 19th-century perspective in assuming that those dark continents remain largely uncivilized, populated entirely by noble savages in a state of semi-evolved beatitude. Rice and spice, and so forth.

If I'm going to murder a friend, I prefer it to be premeditated. Alliteration is for nerds. I'm a patriot. So usually I'll keep my mouth shut or at least try to see both sides of whatever someone's complaint may be. I'm often guilty of the very thing that hacks me off. For example, my place of employment has a public restroom, one that is very clearly marked with a large sign that reads "restrooms." Still, my department is situated in such a location that, every hour, we get asked, "where is the restroom." This shouldn't bother me. Most of the time it doesn't. People gots to pee (and, apparently, whack it). My role as a bathroom locator is irksome only when I'm already annoyed at something else, whatever the reason. People don't read signs, coupons, price tags, etc. They just don't. It's fine. I spend forty hours a week in the place; what appears plainly obvious to me may read like Sanskrit to someone else. But I don't always follow directions, either. Whose fault is it that I missed the exit off the interstate? Unless the Holstein my dad somehow mistook for a Great Dane is in the car distracting me by administering history's most sensual interspecies wet willie, most likely it's my bad. Can't blame the Highway Department for that one.

What most often annoys employees about customers is their apparent sense of entitlement and the lack of appreciation often on display. Many people assume that if they can think of a product, it must exist, and that being able to imagine something necessarily means not only that someone else has already thought of it, but that they have also decided to make it commercially available. Reasoning of this sort, in which the thought is mistakenly assumed to have led to a result, is known as magical thinking and occurs most frequently in children and, apparently, retail customers: "I need the accompaniment tracks for the arias in Rimsky-Korsakov's operas Kaschey the Immortal, The Noblewoman Vera Sheloga, and The Invisible City of Kitezh (best three titles ever?) with authentic turn-of-the-century instrumentation. Oh, the Party Tyme Karaoke series doesn't have that one? Can you order it? I need it tomorrow. What do you mean, there's no recording of Sappho reading her own poetry? Uh, they DO have microphones in Greece, you know. Well, do you know somewhere else I could look?" For the record, I have dozens of wonderful patrons whose company I enjoy, and for them I am eternally grateful, and although working where I do has heightened my sensitivity to those employed in similar circumstances, I know that I'm guilty of various offenses when I'm at other stores. Why? Because I am that demon spawn, loosed upon the world, the Customer. And lo, the eleventh commandment was spake, and it was "the customer is always right." And, I want to be served, dammit: "Hello, part time Linens 'N' Things employee, my name is Matthew and I need a hypo-allergenic throw pillow shaped like the Iberian Peninsula. I'd also like that embroidered with violet peacock feathers. Can you overnight that?" So I understand.

This sense of entitlement is not the sole domain of the customer, though: I've heard a coworker complain that "the customers never clean up after themselves!" and then leave their trash out because "the janitor will get it in the morning." And I've heard someone insult the efficiency of a fellow employee before saying "I know I could finish this [particular menial task that should take about ten minutes] faster, but I'm tired and I get to sit down when I do [this particular task which should take about ten minutes, AT MOST], so I'm going to go slow." Granted, the latter situation is really exemplary only of the terribly corroded, pitch-dripping soul of a fatuous lumpkin who lacks any sense of adult responsibility, but let's go ahead and assume it's indicative of the primarily self-indulgent nature of complaint. Some employees obviously think that customers should go out of their way to be, well, NOT customers. I mportant thing to remember: I'm not working out of the goodness of my heart, I'm working to pay rent and buy stuff. I'm getting paid. You do the job, some of it's good, some of it's bad, those the brokes. Allow me to quote a plethora of post-game interviewees who (unknowingly?) employ the law of identity: "It is what it is. It do what it do," and so forth.

So that's how I feel about complaining: most folks do it and most folks simplify the situation in their own favor.

All the above is merely to say this: the following is not a complaint. It is an humorous vignette.

YESTERDAY THIS DUMB FUGLY BITCH WALKED HER FAT ASS IN AND ASKED THE STUPIDEST FUCKING QUES--

No. Sorry. Not complaining.

A lot of the time, we get requests from people who don't have a lot of information about the item they're seeking. From my first day onward, the running joke has been "Hi, I'm looking for a book with a red cover, it's about this big, and I think it costs like fifteen dollars," to which the only polite reply is "oh, I'm sorry, unfortunately we can't search by cover color, perhaps if you knew the title or the author, maybe the subject?" So it's a blessing when someone comes in with any or all of this information; they've done their homework and the whole exchange will be quick and easy. Even a fragment of a name or a title, and we can usually figure out what they're looking for.

A few days ago, a customer entered my department and asked me for an item. Perhaps you remember earlier, when I mentioned "magical thinking"? I was certain that the item she asked me for was one of these "if you build it, they will come" products.

She said, "I'm looking for a CD, it's a collection of traditional Scottish songs played on authentic instruments, bagpipes and drum, and the title of the CD has the words 'Amazing Grace' in it. It think it's a new release."

"Alright, let me check the computer," I said. And did. Sometimes it's important, even if you KNOW we don't have something in stock, will NEVER have something in stock, to give them the show: check the computer, try a few different keywords and spellings, bite your lip and squint at the screen. This way, they know you've tried and they feel satisfied that you're not just blowing them off. So, I put in the information she'd given me, and miracle of all miracles, there it is. "Amazing Grace: All-Time Bagpipe Favorites", by the Scottish National Pipe & Drum Corps and Military Band, released at the end of August, this year. I clicked on the product to pull up the information for her. She looked at it. I waited for my canonization into retail sainthood.

"I don't think that's it."

WHAT? SUPERNOVA ANEURYSM, middle of my skull. WHAT??!? THE FUCK YOU MEAN THAT'S NOT IT?

Very politely, my voice betraying nary a HINT of the pressurized exasperation squirming inside me like the chest-burster from Alien, I said "Ma'am, I think if you're looking for a recently released bagpipes and drum album with 'Amazing Grace' in the title, this is probably the one."

"No, I don't think that's it."

"Alright, Ma'am. Well, you just let me know if there's anything else I can help you with." She stared at me for a second, then turned around and began to browse. Cardinal sin on my part, I know, not to be able to find the OTHER bagpipes and drum album with "Amazing Grace" in the title that had been recently released. Imagine, if you will, the following, and you'll get an idea of how I felt:

"Alright, ma'am, I know your son Billy has been stuck down at the bottom of this well for almost four hours now, but we're just about to pull him up and out, easy now, fellas, easy does it... steady, steady, one last tug ...okay, here he is! Billy! Here's your mom, tough guy! Reunited at last!!

What's that, Ma'am? Excuse me? What do you mean this isn't your child? You said your Billy fell down THIS well. We found THIS Billy - your name IS Billy, isn't it, son? - His name IS Billy, Ma'am - he was in THIS well. Ma'am, he's wearing a harness that matches the kiddy leash you've got there, in your hand. No Ma'am, there were no other children in the well. Ma'am, you can't just say 'that's not him' and be done with it! This is obviously YOUR child! See, he's even hugging your leg and calling you 'my mother, who called the fire department to rescue me, Billy, out of this well she saw me fall into four hours ago,' and I'll be damned if that isn't an awfully specific thing for a child to say if he's not, in fact, your child.

Not yours. You insist, I see.

Alright, boys, throw the ragamuffin back in the hole." NOOOOOOOOO! --- [SPLASH].


Idiot.

Not complaining. I just think it's funny. Hi-fucking-larious.