With All Due Respect

When out and about, I treat everyone with the utmost respect, especially if they happen to be drawing my blood, preparing my food or filling my prescriptions. I mean, I don't see any reason to be rude to people who are out doing their jobs--unless of course it takes them fifteen minutes to count back change, then that's just a free-for-all. Someone has to salt the french fries. Someone has to run the cash register. Someone has to deliver the newspaper or the mail. We depend upon these things and when they are not readily available to us, we fall apart.

I tell my dad to say "please" and when ordering food. When the person at the drive thru asks how you are, the standard reply is, "Fine, thanks, and yourself?" You may not really care about this person and how life has been treating them, but you have to pretend, if only for a split second. When the person at the drive thru window wishes you a good day, I've told him, "You need to say thank you, not just Yuh." But that is just how he rolls. "Yuh," I have come to discover, can mean many different things. It can mean please or thank you. It can mean yes. It is also the standard greeting when he answers the telephone.

I am always fairly shocked at the lack of respect shown to people who are in a service capacity, those people unfortunate enough to be providing a service in a given industry, whether it be food or retail or in my case, travel. When one provides a service, they are automatically seen as servant, it seems.

I've worked in this airport for just under a year and a half now. And in that time, I have learned that one, people have the tendency to be quite entitled and two, common sense has seemingly gone straight down the shitter. People do not read. People do not think. If the average human being employs only 10% of their brain, the average airline traveler employs somewhere in the vicinty of .o3%.

Where's the restroom? Why don't you try turning around? Baggage Claim? Take another two steps and you'll be standing in the middle of it. US Airways? Probably where the US Airways sign is, but I could always be wrong.

Countless times a day, I have to point people to my immediate left (US Airways) or to my immediate right (United) because people are wandering around looking all bewildered. People come to my counter trying to check in for their respective flights and they've got their ID, credit card and itenerary out before you have sufficient time to tell them that you are not an airline. Somehow, they know everything they will need to check in, but lack the common sense to open their eyes and READ.



I've dealt with rude people. I've had a passport thrown at me. I've been told that I was so rude, it was deserving a phone call to our congressman. I'm still waiting for the fallout of that, by the way. But for whatever reason, I am still shocked whenever I encounter rude people or stupid people. On Monday, I encountered some fucked up hybrid.

In my job, there is a lot of downtime. We all have devised ways of keeping ourselves occupied and I use my copious amounts of freetime to hone my craft--writing, obviously. On Monday, I was about 1,000 words in to a 2,000 word quota when a couple approached my counter. Of course, I didn't see them, being quite engrossed and they were also quite silent. They stood and stared, waiting. Now, had I been in the same situation, it might have gone done a little differently.

I would have said "Hello?" or maybe, "Excuse me?" Quick and simple and polite. You get the person's attention and you manage to not look like a complete asshole. You ask your question, get your answer and go on your merry way.

They stood. And stared. After a moment, I realized they were standing there, not because they said 'excuse me," but because the man whistled. He whistled. I got mad, but not your typical, run-of-the-mill mad, but a quiet, bristly sort of mad, because damn, did your mother teach you no fucking manners at all?

I stood and said nothing because if they weren't going to afford me basic common courtesy, I wasn't going to afford them basic common courtesy, either. Yes, I am fully aware I am a petty cunt. Instead they got my snootiest Yes, How May I Assist You face.

The man growled, "US Airways?"

I pointed at the counter with the large, US Airways sign. You know, the one with people standing at it wearing US Airways shirts? The one with other people lining up to check in? Yeah, that one.

"Oh," said the man.

"Yeah," I said. "You almost got it, though."

Moral of the story: Don't whistle at me to get my attention or you may be gumming your next meal, or at least you'll get my Snooty Face.