What is Happening to Our Society?

Have we as a people become less compassionate?  Do we as a people have less patience?  I wondered this Saturday as I went into a local fabric shop that was going out of business for their"Going out of Business  Everything Must Go Sale". I have gone to a lot of closeout sales in stores in the past, after all we love a good bargain, don't we?  Especially in a stagnant economy. Usually, you encounter a full store with folks eager for a good bargain, you may find one or two rude folks, but for the most part customers and sales clerks are helpful.  Not so on Saturday. The store was filled, long lines curled around the aisles as ladies waited to get bolts of fabric cut.I saw other lines of ladies tapping anxious feet at check out counters as they waited to purchase their items.  Few similes shone on anyone's faces.

I only need a few items, as my budget this time of the month is limited, so I waited in the curled line waiting to approach the cutting tables.  There were about  six staff that saw working both check out and cutting tables.  They could have had more help, with the sale, but since they are going bankrupt, they had to cut where they they could, I suppose.  While I waited in line, three women approached on of the workers at one of the cutting tables with questions as to price.  All three ladies received snippy, curt answers,  The questions all centered around the confusing price markers.  Which, I noticed had not been very clearly marked.  For example on one section of fabrics the marking said, "all fabric 20% off, yet on the bolt of one of the fabrics it said, 30% off.  One of the questions was, "Is that 20% off the 30% sign?"  Seemed like a logical question to me, probably because I thought the same thing.  However the clerk snapped back, "Read the sign, if you can't read that's not my problem."  The lady wanted to have someone go look, but that was not happening.  She would have to get the bolt of fabric and wait in line with the rest of us. Another tiny woman interrupted the same clerk wondering what the price was for some large roll of ( unclear what she said, but it was on the floor and it was large, perhaps a rug?) was?  This time the clerk answered even snippier, and with her angry eyes and voice in place, she told the tiny woman to bring to the line and someone could check price.  Well, the tiny woman seemed appalled.  "But I would have to drag here. I can't carry that," she said.  The clerk responded, "Well, then  drag here."  Tiny woman may have left the  store at that point, I think I might have.  Then to the consternation of  those nearest the clerk, she started to whisper to another clerk.  Whatever they whispered their eyes looked at us in the line.  Some of  the line waiters looked down.  Why is whenever anyone whispers, we assume, they must be whispering about us? 

To give the sales clerks the benefit of the doubt, and after all as Christians shouldn't we do that, I felt sorry for them.  They are losing their jobs.  Some were young and could probably find work elsewhere, but some were probably in their 50's early 60's, so work may difficult to find.  They were short-staffed.  There must have literally been over 80 people in the small store, so how could six staff take care of them all?  Most of the customers I saw wanted to get the best deal for herself that she could.  One woman even took something out of another woman's had, because she said, she saw it first.  Why she didn't pick it up then, I have no idea.  The average customer had as little thought for the clerks as they had for them.

As for the clerks, they were busy, and most of them had probably been dealing with rude people and were tired of it, so they left the dam break and vented at the customer, after all, it won't cost them their jobs, since their jobs were virtually gone. However, a soft answer turns away wrath, right?  (Proverbs 15:1) So when my turn finally approached, I thought I would show the clerk who helped me that I had sympathy for them.  "Thank you for your kind help.  I am so sorry that you will be losing your job."  Sounds like a soft answer to, "Get over here, on this side of the table, you in jean skirt, I don't have all day,"  Right?  The clerk stared, and said, "What do you know about anything, not move it so I can to the next lady. You in the yellow pants get over here."

Alrighty, then, I moved to checkout.  She said absolutely nothing, so I thought it best on to stir to the pot. Part 2 coming up