Making a Turn-around

Years ago, the Mormons had these public service ads that were these slice of life vignettes about a bad situation that we have the power to suddenly make into a good one. I really loved those ads. One of them I remember was a teen boy watching TV with the garbage truck coming down the street and the dad asks him tersely if he'd taken out the garbage, and the kid hadn't.

So that was the turning point. You expect the father to start yelling and the kid feels bad but the father gets this twinkle in his eye and says, "Well, then you and I better hurry to see if we can beat the truck to our house" and off they go running and laughing.

Today I had ordered groceries on line and noticed that they would be coming from 61st Street Food Emporium, and not my 86th Street store. My delivery slot was 1 to 3. I guess the good news is that I read and did laundry waiting for the groceries to arrive, but at 2:50 I was beginning to get pissed off when the phone rang.

It was the delivery guy telling me there is no Apartment B at my address. Ok, I knew that wasn't right so we went back and forth about the building, the address, etc. when he realized he was at 78th Street, not 87th Street. He was sort of insistent that the form said 78th which I knew it didn't, but then he saw his mistake.

When he arrived, I was ok to him, sort of cool, and then he asked me if I knew that the groceries came from 61st Street and I said yes and he said something like he knows all his old customers, but now he has new ones.

That was my turning point.

So I said with a smile, "Next time, you'll know" and he said yes and I asked him what his name is and he said something I couldn't understand. I believe these guys are Sengalese... so he spelled it for me -- S-O-W-E pronounced "so." I put my hand out and we shook hands and I felt so much better than to be the bitchy customer. I really don't want to be that customer, although, God knows, I am frequently pushed to it. At least today, I turned it around. Only for him, though, as I feel he deserved the break.