"Please be kind to our receptionists"

was an alarming note I saw as I went into a medical clinic on Friday. I wondered what had happened for that to need to appear.

I didn't know the receptionist I approached. She is new and a bit uncertain. I had gone in to pick up a prescription for a very elderly patient and this new receptionist wasn't sure she should give it to me. Fortunately the clinic's nurse came out at that point and said, "Hello Cat." She vouched for me and even made sure that I knew what the prescription was for so that I could explain it to the patient.

I pedalled off trying to work out what I would have done if the receptionist had refused to give me the prescription. A number of solutions presented themselves.  Any of them would have worked and I would probably have tried the clinic nurse one first. I might have asked the receptionist to speak to the doctor or perhaps to ring the patient after explaining how difficult it is for them to have a phone conversation these days. I might have waited for the other receptionist, who knows me, to come back from her lunch break. What I would not have done is become angry.

I went on from there to a place where I had inquired about getting a small job done. I had been asked to leave the object which needed altering with them so that their specialist worker could look at it. The woman I had spoken to earlier in the week had not been certain. That was fine with me. I would rather she found out. 

The owner of the business came out looking anxious. They couldn't do the job. "That's fine," I told her, "If you can't then you can't."

Her reaction surprised me. She looked relieved, so relieved I said, "I wasn't going to be angry if you couldn't."  If anything she looked even more relieved. 

The owner has lost the ability to speak in anything other than a faint whisper and she rarely appears at the desk. That is left to her staff - staff who are intensely loyal to her. I thought of how difficult it must be for her to run a small business in the way she does. How could I get angry if she was being honest enough to tell me she could not do something for me?

She held up her hand to stop me from leaving and wrote something down on a piece of paper. "Try them. Tell them I sent you," she told me. 

I thanked her and left. I haven't had a chance to try the suggestion yet but I will.  

On my way home I stopped at the upholstery business. The owner saves the left over dacron stuffing and passes it on to me to give to the charity toy makers. It would just get thrown out if they did not use it. It helps the upholsterer as well as the toy makers. There was a notice there asking people not to come into the shop if they were feeling unwell. It is a perfectly reasonable notice. If he isn't well he isn't working and he owns the business so he would not be getting an income. Apparently someone complained about that notice. I thought of the  notice asking people to be kind to the receptionists and the way the other business owner had looked relieved.

There seems to be something really wrong with the world right now. I hope it improves. Being pleasant and polite is so much easier than being angry isn't it?