Elucidating Questions

People are truly a mystery

Woman brings up an item she says it’s supposed to be 30% off

It’s already 20% off in the system so I had to calculate it myself

With the calculator I put total x 0.7

And put that in the system

She goes but why does your tablet say (total)?

I explained how I did the calculation

She goes

I don’t want it

Another woman comes up with a code I don’t recognise claiming it’s a gift card

I read the fine print on the screenshot because she won’t bring up the full email “no data”

Fine print says usable ONLINE at Mind The stores

Not Ancient Maritime Fleet

I say this she says I want to speak to your manager

Okay

Manager tells me to enter the code

I’m ready to have egg on my face

Nope, it doesn’t work

Now manager reads the fine print and repeats exactly what I said to the customer

Well fine, but it worked at Mind The

No kidding

I’m just having an odd customer day

I hate saying something, having to call my manager and have them say the exact same thing before the customer will listen

All my experience means nothing in the face of Karen calling for the manager

People say Karen is a slur

I hope so, because they’ve done enough damage to me and other customer service workers they deserve to feel it hit them back

Drugs are great

The pain killers the doctor gave me worked

I was an hour into my shift when I realised

I’m not in pain

How dangerous

And when the cracks started to show

I can take two a day

But I know I shouldn’t

Isn’t it kind of twisted that I have to keep a measure of pain or else I’ll become addicted to not feeling pain?

Imagine that addicted to the feeling of not being in pain all the time

If I seek normalcy, I seek drug dependence

But I got through work

So many weird customers today

And my job is trying to make cashier’s jobs harder

Separate out all online returns (about 50-60% of returns, up to 80% some days) scan each item, sort depending on category

Also reticket everything without one

Also be on cash in one of the busiest stores in the country

Also you’re the only one on cash

I ended up with this huge pile of clothes

Did not reticket anything

Feeling the stress of having too many responsibilities

These fucking genius execs with their delegation of duties

I’d like to see one of them work a full shift in my store

As a cashier

Damages now also collect in a pile in the back

I have worked in many retail places

Anywhere that has “a pile in the back” of anything?

Grows and grows and grows until it’s a 12 hour job that some poor person, usually the person no one likes, has to deal with in 8 hours

Also usually then that unliked person gets forced to do it forever or else it will get that bad again

Working is hard and I struggle with it so much

I struggle with having to hold my tongue for customer service

Being less than other people

Being owned by someone else

I’m generally a nice person

Just, in general

I can become as cold as Pluto on the drop of a dime

Usually it means I’m anxious

Confused

Overwhelmed

But I don’t think there’s a person on this planet who knows that

And I never treat people how I feel

That meaning, even if I dislike them or something they did I will still be courteous

My main problem is, and I don’t know why this is

I struggle with tone of voice

I copy the tones people have used to me

Thinking that’s how they’re supposed to be said

And get told I have an attitude problem

I have struggled with this all my life

I didn’t know that was what I was struggling with until I learned the part about masking and mirroring that neurodivergent people do

And I try

But when I make up my own tones people look at me weird

And when I copy how other people talk to me other people get mad

I can’t tell you how many times growing up I was just trying to say something and people told me I have an attitude problem

Sent to my room sobbing because I didn’t understand what I did wrong

People then said I cried whenever I didn’t get my way when I was just absolutely bewildered about being sent to my room for talking

I don’t do it on purpose

In fact, if I were to speak how I want to speak most of it would be monotone or good natured

And not monotone as in attitude, monotone as in I don’t fucking know what tone to use so I’m using neutral

Communicating is hard

Working is hard

I’m exhausted

That math one really shook me

Because I fucking swear I have math trauma

I was good at math until teachers wouldn’t let me do the equations how I wanted

And then I was terrible at it because I couldn’t wrap my head around formulas

But I’ve started using it again

Even doing math in my head just for fun

And I really thought I had the formula for 30% off figured out

And that woman freaked out

And I showed two other co-workers my formula and they said it was right

And I’m still fucking worried it wasn’t and I’ve been doing percentages wrong this whole time

So thanks lady