As I sit with my near 14 year old daughter in a café, I was musing on something that happened to me a week ago. I had set out to do some early Thanksgiving Day shopping, sweeping the eggnog display for the tasty Cream of Weber brand that sells out if you're unlucky, and getting some pumpkin pies in the bargain.Over at the bakery, as I was foraging for a certain cookie, one of the bakers came over to help me. She asked me what I was looking for and I eagerly told her I was searching for "maroons".
I should probably take time to note that the sun was freshly over the mountains, yet I hadn't been to bed yet. I was going through a nasty bit of insomnia. When I'm tired the first warning sign that my brain is about to seize, aside from spontaneous ticking, is the disconnect between my mouth and my mind.
If my ADHD mind is like an iPhone with a cracked screen, my tired ADHD mind is like a waterlogged Blackberry with taffy in the keys. Its bad enough trying to express what's in my mind on a good day. On a bad day, I'm usually just as surprised as the listener at what comes out of my mouth.
Now, I know what you're thinking. Don't beat yourself up, you might say. Anybody could make that mistake. We usually look in the beer aisle for the morons. Then I'd tell you I wasn't shopping after midnight like I usually do, and I was looking for macaroons and you'd snigger just like the nice, short bakery lady.
"Sure, let's find you some red cookies," she yucked as she led me over to the special cookie section reserved only for idiots who ask for help.
There they were, over-toasted and in perfect prefabricated puck shapes. Not quite the swirling, artsy macaroons with a cherry on top that I had in mind.
"Are they all coconut?" I asked, meaning toasted.
"Is there any other kind?" she inquired with a smirk.
I quickly corrected my mistake, but I was hardly impressed with her adversarial customer service. As Bugs Bunny would say, "What a maroon".
There was a time when interacting with snotty store peons who mocked me would have upset me on a molecular level. I would have sworn never to visit the store again, hated myself, then beat myself up about it for days. Every time I drove by the store I would remember the incident hotly and hate myself all over again. On the other hand, if I was feeling confident I would have confronted them over their rudeness and then complained to management.
I thought about that afterwards and realized I was a lot happier without all the drama. I was also mildly surprised that I didn't get angry at the lady, but simply shuffled on. In the past if I didn't fight it was mostly because I didn't trust myself. This time, however, I just wanted to shop and get home to bed. I suppose I should consider that progress.
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