My head is swimming with ideas for the upcoming Clockpunk and Cavemen game, I'm making arrangements for character creation sessions, Johnbai is scheduling extra session of D&D, I've gotten some geek-ware in the mail, and so on, and so on. But I thought that I wouldn't talk about that stuff tonight, but rather about something real.
Some weeks ago, I was returning from my evening class that ended in Belltown at about 9:30, and stopped by the Safeway to pick up a few items on the way home.
Checking out, I noticed that it was rather busy for a late night in the supermarket; several checkout stands were staffed, and all of them had lines. I, of course, joined the one that had some sort of problem ahead - something about a refund, or a card that wouldn't read, just one of those things that makes an otherwise simple transaction take four or five times longer than it usually does.
As we other customers waited in line, the fellow behind me began to get agitated. He was a few years older than me, a bit scruffy in his motorcycle jacket, and had apparently had a few drinks prior to coming in to purchase the single twenty-ouncer of malt liquor that comprised his shopping. The delay was frustrating him; he was muttering and complaining - "Come on!" and "What's going on here?" and "These people can't even run a store!" - and shuffling his feet, looking vainly for another faster or shorter line to jump to. I was pretty cool with waiting, and I started to to think about formulating a response to this guy, who was making himself very present and looking as if he might go off at any moment.
I could remember a time when I would have been right there with him: "Yeah, man, what is up with this place? Can't they even check us out?!" I think it has been a while since that was my default response, though.
I could remember a time in the past when I would have confronted him: "Hey, pal, give it a rest, willya? We're all just trying to get home and we don't need you flapping your gums." I would be looking to exert moral authority over someone who was breaching the peace; what right did he have to mess with a perfectly peaceful night? I realized that down that road lay, as it usually does, no productive outcome.
I thought about these things, and decided that the best bet was to let neither the delay itself nor my linemate's poor attitude ruin my evening. I ignored him and stood there wrapped in my own ataraxia, letting (or trying to let) any sense of frustration or impatience with the entire situation wash over, through, or past me. I think, for the most part, it worked.
I was reflecting on this experience the next day, when it struck me that there was actually an even better way to respond to this situation: I should have offered this fellow my place in line. I mean, it was obvious that for whatever reason, getting that beer and getting out of that store quickly was important to him, while another few moments wait would not have mattered to me. What would I have lost by letting him go ahead? Nothing. What would he have gained? An incremental advance toward his goal and maybe a sense of some little victory. And what would I have gained? A more peaceful wait on line.
It seemed like a good outcome all around, as long as I let go of any sense of investment in the process of checking out and the "rules of the line," which are ultimately arbitrary anyway. It was only in that imaginary realm that I would have "lost" anything. And the more I thought about it, the more I felt that an agitated, solitary guy who really, really needed a beer at 10:00 pm on Tuesday was probably in a lot worse shape than I was, in more ways than one; why not give him this small boon?
I was discussing the matter with Johnbai the next day, and we considered the possibility that the offer would have been interpreted as sarcastic or insulting, leading to precisely the kind of pointless conflict and agitation that I had been seeking to avoid. How could this be avoided? We decided that the only chance would be if the offer were made genuinely, authentically, and without any guile. Only then would the honest person-to-person contact actually be made.
So, the big question then remains: how do I become a person for whom this sort of response is genuine, authentic, and automatic, and not an intellectual consideration of the next day?
I don't know if the answer lies with Epicurus or Bodhidharma, but I think I'll keep looking.
Chop wood, carry water.
In the meanwhile, there's some hit point calculations I need to make for some NPCs, and I need to check for some cheap d6 online. Catch you later!
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4 comments:
I'm putting my money on Bodhidharma.
You can't talk sense to a drunk.
Especially if you're invisible.
Or, at the very least, negligible.
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