Although the holiday season often earns its reputation for the most wonderful time of year among children, it tends to take on a different character for adults.
Between the rush to figure out and then get what people in your family want and the expense that comes with it, it’s natural for the lead-up to Christmas to feel more stressful than joyful. And when we’re under a lot of pressure, that pressure can sometimes vent itself in some unpleasant ways.
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One trip to the mall on Black Friday or Christmas Eve should tell us everything we need to know about that reality, but this stress can sometimes lead people to take their frustrations out on people who don’t deserve it.
And sadly, nobody bears the brunt of that abuse more than those working in retail. One mom had a chance encounter that served as a stark reminder of this fact. And now that her post about it has gone viral, it can hopefully help us locate our best selves in these tense situations.
Whitney Fleming runs a blog called Playdates on Fridays, but she decided to share her most recent musings on Facebook.
In her post , she detailed a visit she had to Target one evening in which the search for some supplies for a holiday party ballooned into a spree that saw her cart overflowing with holiday items, including a “Ho, Ho, Ho” throw pillow.
Target does have that effect sometimes.
Since it wasn’t so busy that night, Fleming was able to strike up a conversation with the teenaged boy helping her check out.
As she wrote, the pajamas she had picked out for her dog led them to bond over their respective, unruly dogs.
Eventually, the employee said, “I can always tell who are the nice and easy customers even before they get to my line.”
To this, Fleming joked, “Really? Lots of old, crotchety ladies, huh?”
This led her to learn that it was actually moms who gave him the hardest time and it didn’t matter whether they had kids with them or not.
It’s not as if he wasn’t able to see things through their perspectives, either.
As he told her, “I mean, I get it. I’m the oldest of five and my mom works and is pretty stressed, but I’ve never seen her be mean to a retail worker or waitress or anything. It’s just hard when you’ve never worked before and people start yelling at you. This is my third job already, and it’s the same at all of them.”
One of the examples he had was a young mom who left all of her items at the checkout and walked out when her coupon wouldn’t work.
Another apparently got it into her head that it was his fault the grocery store he worked for set up a Pokémon card display near his register and she had to keep telling her children they couldn’t have them.
However, neither of these were the worst he had to deal with.
That dubious honor went to the woman who complained about his job performance to the manager because he couldn’t track down the specific toy her child wanted with their kid’s meal.
As the employee scanned Fleming’s items, she thought back to times she had been curt to retail workers.
In those instances, she wanted to get home to put her kids down for a nap or felt that a register mistake was affecting her free time.
These moments began to haunt her because she realized that her own kids could one day be in the same position as those cashiers.
As she wrote, “I don’t know when we went off the rails as parents. I don’t know when we thought yelling or belittling or undermining young people just trying to do their jobs was okay.”
During this post, she made it clear that she understood how “overwhelmed and undervalued” mothers can be, particularly during the holidays.
“But,” she wrote, “maybe we need to remember that our babies will one day be entering the workforce, and how would we want them to be treated? And what are our kids learning when they see us treat others this way?”
Fleming’s conversation with the teen led her to add on a $10 Starbucks gift card for him to her purchase.
She said, “Have a frappuccino on me. It’s for dealing with all of us crazy, stressed-out moms.”
This led him to seem nervous about getting in trouble and he said, “Oh, no, ma’am. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything.”
She then insisted, saying, “No, I’m sorry, Have a great holiday.”
In an update, she later said she followed up with the store’s management and confirmed her little gift wouldn’t get the employee in trouble. She also said, “The BEST thing to do when you want to support a kind retail worker is to fill out the online survey or tell a manager.”
h/t: Facebook | Playdates on Fridays by Whitney Fleming