Common Courtesy for Dummies

Common Courtesy for Dummies

'Your call is important to us, please stay on the line and we'll be right with you!'

The chirpy female voice advised me for at least the twentieth time, becoming more hateful with each repetition. My idle mind had decided the voice probably belonged to some narcissistic little gen-Y tween who was probably sending one handed tweets as she recorded her glib message. Was that a mocking undertone I detected? I decided it was.

Glancing at my watch for the hundredth time I calculated that I had now been on hold for twenty five minutes. To an electronics store! I don't know why, but that made it even more annoying. If it had been something more essential I told myself, perhaps something of a more official nature, wasting my time; say a call to report a hoon driver, or even something I was doing for myself it would have been more bearable. But no, I was waiting on hold trying to find out if the local outlet had a copy of the DVD anthology of Sex in the City for my wife, a show that I could barely stand to be in the same room with let alone watch.

The sudden click of the receiver being picked up broke my reverie and I took a deep breath, ready express my displeasure at being made to wait for so long before whoever was on the receiving end addressed my query.

*CLICK*

The line went dead. The bastards had hung up on me without even bothering to answer. Cursing loudly I glanced at my watch again. I had twenty minutes until the store closed. Time seemed to stop for a very long second as I pictured the rest of the day, myself returning home later that evening empty handed, my wife opening the door, her happy smile as she looked for the birthday gift she had been hinting at for the last week morphing slowly into a martyred grimace. Following would be an uncomfortable dinner and a cold and uncomfortable night alone on the lounge in the TV room.

As my brain snapped back to the present my body was already moving, hands juggling car keys, sunglasses and wallet as I fumbled my way out the front door and into the car. I still had time to get to the store before they closed, assuming they even had it of course. I interrupted the internal diatribe, directed at whoever had hung up on me, long enough to offer a quick prayer that the store had the damn DVD in stock as I sped down the road.

Luckily traffic wasn't terrible and fifteen minutes later I was jamming my keys into my pocket and making my way through the busy parking lot, trying to avoid being run over by SUV's piloted by soccer mum's distracted their yammering brood strapped into the rear seats. Quick stepping through the brightly lit shopping centre I noticed that the store already had their rollers pulled down halfway in an attempt to discourage last minute shoppers entering and holding up their close down. Looking straight ahead I ignored the pimply faced security guard who called ineffectually after me, protesting that the store was closing.

It was still quite busy inside as I made my way to the home entertainment section, looking hopefully for an unattached sales person I could approach. And there, by providence was one, a greasy looking kid with a sad looking crop of fuzz on his chin, tight black hipster pants and canvas runners, his name plate read 'Russell'.

'Excuse me Russell', I began, to which Russell did his utmost to ignore me and look busy, or as busy as someone can look while leaning listlessly on a counter.

I tried again. 'Hello Russell? I need some help.'

Realising I probably wasn't going to just go away, hipster Russell gave issue to a gusty sigh and finally turned to acknowledge me. 'Yeah?'

Just as I was about to launch into my brief and concise explanation for my presence I was interrupted by the loud digital ringing of the phone sitting on the counter. Russel glanced down at the phone as I waited, deciding it was common courtesy to let him quickly answer the phone with a quick 'Can you hold please' before continuing to serve me. Instead he looked back at me with an apathetic expectancy, 'Yeah?' he repeated.

'Aren't you going to answer that?' I asked waspishly, my annoyance growing. Russell just shrugged, still directing his bored stare at me. 'Go ahead' I said, 'just let them know they need to wait, I won't be long.' With his gaze still locked with mine Russell reached out his hateful hipster hand, lifted the receiver and dropping it back into the cradle. The sudden silence left by the absence of the ringing phone struck me in the face like the blow of a gauntlet hurled by a hipster knight.

***********************

'Sir?' The Constable's voice repeating the question brought me back to a reality my brain was doing its best to avoid.

'Sorry? Yes' I mumbled lamely.

'Sir, why did you hit the sales attendant? I need a statement.' He managed to sound bored and disdainful at the same time. From deep down, under its suffocating blanket of anxiety and shame my brain struggled to provide me with some kind of answer, an explanation that would at least partly justify my actions.

'Ummmm...... He wouldn't answer the phone.'

The Constable stopped writing long enough long enough to glance at me, as if to determine whether I was in fact having a lend of him, before shaking his head and finishing the chronicle of my shame.