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November 14, 2006
Hard Ball of Cold Indifference
[Here's what has been simmering (or festering?) these last few weeks. This is why I haven't been posting in a while. So here's my summary, my rant, my anger, my hard ball of cold indifference.]
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Ah, the Holiday Shopping Season. I refuse to call it Christmas, because Christmas has nothing to do with the consumerist frenzy I observe every day in The Department Store. It's The Holiday Shopping Season. Here are some marked differences between life in a department store and life outside, in the real world.
- The Evergreeny-Red-and-Greeny decorations went up overnight (they worked an overnight shift!) right after the Halloween push was over. So starting the 31st, they worked that evening and all night to get the wreaths, swags, berries and evergreen twigs, posters, and all that crap up. That way shoppers could see the decorations up on the first of November.
- They worked to get the decorations ready for hanging for a couple weeks before Halloween. That means that she was trimming trees, straightening wreath branches, and organizing swags all over the Break Room starting about October 10. Yes, that early.
- The endless soundtrack of kitchy/nostalgic/traditional music has begun. It was very cunningly chosen, to evoke memories and days of yore. It plays all day long in the Store and so it plays all night long in my head.
- There's so much stuff in the store. There's so much more stuff! It's all santas and reindeer and holly leaves and snowmen and candles and peppermints and cranberries and stars and snowflakes. So much of it is coordinated, so that you are tempted to buy the matching placemats, napkins, napkin rings, plates, serving bowls, wall hangings, and santa-head mugs. Ick. It's so cute and tempting but it's really expensive when you load it all in your cart and get to the register.
- It's only mid November and people are already shopping for gifts. They buy, say, one or two or three gifts for each person on their list and end up with $600 (easily) of merchandise. Then they complain about the price. But they are the ones making the decision to follow along (like lemmings to the cliff edge) with Marketing's Master Plan. (You're not a lemming! You're a person! You were created with thought and ration and reason! Why aren't you using it???)
- There's so much more stuff in the store, and there are so many more customers in the store. There are extra-super-spectacular-extended hours more often these days to accomodate all the shoppers for all the extra stuff. Just the amount of people I ring up each day makes my head spin...so many people in the store buying so much stuff!
- Extended hours...even with so, so, so, so many people coming to shop, the store still doesn't really get hopping till 10-11am. Even on a Saturday! Even on a supersaleSaturday, it really doesn't get so busy that it's steady till 10 am or so! So people come in and get stuff that they freely choose to buy, but then complain about the traffic and the busyness in the store and the long lines at the cashier...but don't bother coming in before 9:30. They could come in a little earlier and beat the crowds, but no! They have to come in the same time as all the other stupid lemmings and then complain about it.
- Black Friday is Coming. It's coming, people. My shift starts at 5am. Yikes.
- Marketing. Honestly, do people have no rational thought when it comes to commercials and radio spots and newspaper ads? They see the ad and they don't connect the dots that The Department Store is saying, in effect, "Come here and buy stuff and make your Christmas happy and memorable and suffused with the soft glow of candlelight, firelight, and love." I'm sick to death of marketing.
So the Most Wonderful Time of the Year has pushed me over the edge. I hate marketing and how it seems to short-out rational thought. I hate greed and how much it drives sales. I hate covetousness. I hate manipulation. I hate that I am changing because I spend so much time in this world.
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Here's how I'm changing:
- I don't care as much anymore.
- I see people less as created, dignified Image bearers (like a good Covenant grad does) and more like stupid, easily manipulated lemmings.
- I've had one too many experiences like the following: Customer comes up to register, yapping cheerfully with mother/daughter/motherinlaw/shoppingbuddy, talking animatedly about whatever, seeming like a perfectly nice person. Then she interrups her cheerful demeanor she shines on her shoppingbuddy, and accuses me (either directly or passive-aggressively) of purposefully ringing her stupid santa knickknacky crap whatever as 1.99 more than it was signed as in the back of the store! No joke, folks, she is really good at making me feel like a dummy, a stupid yokel, a badly dressed boor that just fell off the turnip truck or just got off the boat, or an ugly stepsister worthy of being talked to like a stupid tree stump.
- I'm full up to here [points to eyebrows] of self-satisfied divas treating me like crap just because I'm behind the register...that's who I see now, instead of a person--I see a Diva that I loathe. (And that makes me no better than they are...they see nothing but a cashier, I see nothing but a stupid lemming customer.)
- I have no problem interrupting people to answer their question because I know what they are asking before the ask it. (Returns are at customer service...The restroom is in the back of the store, behind customer service...That discount is only good with your Department Store Credit Card...No, that price changed. It's after 1 pm, and the sale prices were advertised till 1pm. Here's the ad; see, it says 1pm...No, we're out of those...No, there are no more in the back; what we have is what's out on the shelves...No, today is not senior day.)
- I don't care when they find themselves trapped by addiction to consumerism. Instead of feeling compassion for these poor souls, trapped like a dolphin in a tuna net in their own desire to possess moremoremore, I despise them for their stupidity and willingness to be duped by sin.
- I compare myself to the stupid lemming customers and find myself superior, and I fail to see that as sin, just as sinful and just as needful of the Redeemer as they are, trapped in their addiction to consuming.
- I'm hard. I have this hard little nub in the bottom of my heart, where I just don't care anymore if people mistreat me or themselves. It's like a calloused spot...and it's a hard little ball of calloused judgment that sits in judgment over the stupid lemming customers and finds them wanting. It's worse than active, bitter hate. It's cold and hard and uncaring. I'm hardened.
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So what does this mean? It means I am officially (though not offically at The Department Store) on the job hunt again. I'll give them my two weeks' notice and begone. Once I find a new job. And it won't be in retail.
Stories from Behind the Counter | By The Newest Worker | 07:53 PM
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