A long one...
Clerking 10
Enlightenment
One of my colleagues, after reading my missives on the art
of clerking, presented me with the idea that, while these writings occasionally
amuse in a Seinfeldian way, they also, unfortunately, serve to justify,
condone, and even aggrandize the petty grievances and bitterness of clerk life.
Shouldn’t we, he posited, rise above these irritations. He has and is the
happier for it. Who cares if someone brought him 18 DVD sleeves he had to get
the DVDs for? One has to work anyway. Why resist whatever work comes your way,
work that you will do whether you resent it or not.
I commended him for his wisdom. One need only look at a
random example of clerking to see the superiority of his approach.
Let’s start with my approach. I am sitting peaceably at the
checkout desk. Perhaps I am alphabetizing requests and peaceably wondering what kind of clerk Herman Melville was
(difficult to tell as people tend to go on about his writing), or I am, in my quest to have important community information at the ready, tracking
the progress of a slow moving but vicious thunderstorm that, though still about
4 hours west of us, I have already pinned my hopes of a quiet evening on, or,
dare I even dream it, dare I even name the sacred name, a blackout. As I drift
into a fantasy about a terrific bolt of lightning smashing through our skylight
window high above the consumer information table, I am interrupted by an
approaching patron. Curiously the patron is announcing in their loudest
speaking voice “I am at the Library.” This seems obvious to me, and the child,
squirming and being half-dragged behind this patron, is either clear on it
already or not very interested. The
patron is holding their tiny phone to their ear with one hand and gripping the
poor kid with the other so that the items they have are pinioned awkwardly
between elbow, ribs and armpit. Awkwardly also describes how the books are
dropped in front of me. They spill across the desk. No words are addressed to me
but rather the patron continues to proclaim biblically into their little
device.
“Maybe we should have chicken tonight”
I am at a complete loss as to what to do with all these
items piled before me, so I greet the child.
“Tough day?” I ask.
I do not get a
response, just a wide, shocked stare. The parent/kidnapper holds out a library
card to me. Ah, I know what to do with this. I put it under the laser to bring
up the patron’s record. Fortunately there is something I can use there.
“It says here that your request for “Lethal Weapon 2”
expired. Is it okay if I delete the note?” I ask directly into the patron’s
talking.
“Hold on a minute.” The patron says to the not there person.
“What?”
My first word addressed to me. I am very excited! “Four
years ago you didn’t get in to pick up “Lethal Weapon 2” when it came in for
you. Do you mind if I take the note regarding it off your record?”
“Uh, no, go ahead.”
Four more words!
“Yeah, I’m checking my books out now.” The patron lies to
their remote intimate. I’m the one doing the checking out. As the patron begins to return to the chicken
possibilities I interrupt.
“You have a 30 cent late charge on your card.”
“What? Wait. I’ll see you in a few minutes. I better go.”
The patron closes their cell phone.
We conclude our business.
Now let’s look at my colleague’s approach.
He is sitting peaceably at the checkout desk. He is
alphabetizing requests. A noisy patron approaches and he contentedly checks out
their items.
That’s it.
Even I, nursing my bitterness and irritations, am sort of
moved by the beautiful simplicity of my co-workers method. This is not some
lightweight fly by night approach. It is, in its way, the expression of an
unassailable philosophy that traces a rich pedigree back into the bosom of
Buddhism. We have several books on this, and though they don’t get checked out
too much, perhaps people should try one or two along with their movies about
people being dismembered. But it doesn’t stop there. This philosophy runs right
through history up into modern best sellers like Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff
that people actually do check out occasionally. That patrons can become
quite contentious about one day late charges of 30 cents on Don’t Sweat the
Small Stuff doesn’t refute the message. Nor does their curious interest
that I not sweat the small stuff as
in “It’s only 30 cents. Why won’t you just waive the charge?” No mere
individual failing can touch on the philosophy in question. Indeed I only bring
it up here because, well, I am doing it again. I can’t resist it; I luxuriate
in bitterness, I hone endlessly on criticism, irritation fascinates me, yes,
certainly, but, maybe, occasionally, hopefully, there is something else as
well…
Humor.
As in, one day we’ll look back on this and laugh. As in,
laughter is the best medicine. As in, laugh and the world laughs with you.
Fear, bitterness, irritation laughed at is defused. If I can take my petty
irritations, decorate them up into elaborate, puffy, intricate confections and
then, while delivering them to a place of honor, drop them sprawling, isn’t it
less aggrandizement than a cautionary tale, a little mudslinging at bitterness.
Is the lesson of my story of the cell phone using patron really just, “My god,
people are so infuriating!” Isn’t it also, “Don’t sweat the small stuff, but
help yourself to the miniscule stuff.” Or “There’s nothing wrong with war as
long as it’s fought with nerf items.” Or “To our great misfortune and relief,
at the right distance, everything is funny.” Isn’t it, really, the same thing
in the end as the Buddhist; don’t sweat the small stuff approach. Only instead
of a zero step process, it’s a two step process. Here, I’ll illustrate:
Enlightenment
Or
Embittered irritation
+ Comic retelling = Enlightenment
Sure the centered detachment of enlightenment sounds
beautiful. Who wouldn’t want peace? Some of us just happen to like more
controlled doses of it allowing for carefully administered amounts: Irritation,
observation, recognition, tomfoolery, and bliss. Repeat as you will. This
second approach works best for me for several reasons. First, pure
enlightenment is kind of overwhelming. Does one lose oneself or doesn’t one?
Who am I if everything is equal to me? I
feel method two allows me to approach with cautious respect, yet still permits
me to keep my preference for, say, cheesecake over liver. Second, as you will
surely realize when you reflect on your experience and all the people you have
ever encountered, enlightenment is an extremely rare and difficult state to get
to. If I were to slip up and get irritated at a person who thrust a mess of
items at me while chatting on a cell phone and torturing their child I might
feel like I was a failure if I were going for scenario one. Under scenario two
I would just think “Oooh, I should write one about cell phones!” and I’d be on
my way. Finally, while the enlightened Siddhartha’s job of ferrying people
across a river may be as mundane as my job, its elegance is suited to a lot of
quiet attention and presence. My work requires more of a loud attention, and I
feel strangely more present when I answer the phone with a clipped, cheerful,
fake British accent than when I just pick up the phone and… listen.
Don’t get me wrong. I follow the way of the fool, but I’ll
keep an open mind, and if my colleague’s enlightenment holds together and looks
impressive enough, well, it’s never too late to just, let go.
What a great post! Very interesting! You have Siddhartha-ed the Clerk! I can't remember, also, what happens in Lethal Weapon 2. Is he still leaping off buildings handcuffed to the perp?
ReplyDeleteThank you for your kind words. To be helpful I looked up Lethal Weapon 2 so that I could relay the plot synopsis for you. I found several plot synopsis, all of them fairly brief, and yet I found them so boring I was unable to read any of them all the way through. I just kept reading about the crashed red sports car with Krugerrands in the trunk and then lost interest. So I am thinking these movies must be more for watching.
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