This afternoon, I walked into a fast food restaurant with a purpose-to get an item for a project my daughter was doing. Yes, a last minute project for a Junior in High School, but truth be told she works 30 hours a week after school, volunteers at a preschool during her days off, and still manages to keep her grades up. I am truly blessed. So when she sends me a tiktok video that she has just seen and tells me that she wants to create the same thing, but doesn’t think she will have time to get all of the materials, I jump to volunteer to run around getting her the supplies at the local fast food restaurant, Party City, and the Dollar Store only to end up using my Cricut to make some of it. But that’s a story for a different time.
As I stood in line at this fast food chain that will remain anonymous, a young boy kept talking to me. He was just so excited that he talked about everything from school, to spiderman, to the shells he held in his hand. The woman behind the register kept asking him to sit down at a nearby table, to stop talking, to please leave me alone and stop bothering the customers. This all meant nothing to him because he was just a little boy who wanted to show someone his shells that he had collected.
When I made my way up to her for my “special request”, she apologized, explaining that she had just picked him up from school, he was so excited and still had several hours of work to do. I smiled and told her not to worry, I completely understood, and he was not bothering me in any way.
She was clearly frantic trying to be a mom and work the cash register while making sure the kitchen had made the right item for her to put in the bag and while I leaned in to her and quietly said it’s ok, I am not sure she understood that I really was saying it was OK.
Sadly, others did not feel this way. Two people from a Delivery Chain were aggravated and quick to say something. Now, I do understand this because I deliver at times too. When bills are due, second jobs for single parents is usually a must. For the delivery people I understood that they were thinking that their tip and possibly their rating could go down if they didn’t deliver the food to the customer within the alloted time set by the delivery company that they contract with.
I tell you this story of the cashier because it reminded me of me of many, many, years ago when my boys were that age. Both of my boys are in thier thirtys and both married, but it was a different time for me when they were younger. Daily I needed to pick them up from elementary school Mon-Fri. on my late lunch hour and bring them back to workplace. I would put them in the nurses station at the hospital I worked at until 7pm when I finally got off of my twelve hour shift. The boys had a blast talking to nurses, doctors, techs. Pretty much anyone who would stop to talk to them. They would draw pictures on the nurse’s chalkboard and usually one or both would create a bit of chaos from time to time. I tried to keep them calm with small jello containers and containers of juice, but day after day it still gets pretty old for a young child. I felt exhausted and humilitated because I didn’t have the resources that everyone else seemed to have.
But my co-workers and really everyone were kind and told me that they understood. They gave me only positive feedback, encouraging me daily. This meant so much to me and with every smile and kind word, I became stronger and stronger.
If you see someone either man or women in this situation, please remember that what we may take for granted, someone else is praying for. Please be kind and go out of your way to give encouragement. You just never know what a positive word could mean to someone struggling.
