The Ambassador Of Good Will

Posted by Scoundrel Ghost




If you work in the service industry
or
have ever worked dealing with the public,


face to face.


then you have probably felt or still feel 


that humanity 


is full of assholes.


We are not assholes all the time.


Some are more than others;


few are assholes 24/7. They do  have to sleep. 


Sometimes we are intentional assholes,


sometimes unintentional.


Now I have worked with people who stop by 
to donate their treasures for which they
no longer have room to contain.


Maybe 
they just need to make more room 
for newer crap.


Mine is not to question.


Some of it can be useful to others; clothes, utensils, cookware, etc.


But most of it is crap. Crap that collects dust, crap to dust around
and crap to sit next to crap, crap to accessorize other crap, 
crap that was given, crap that was received  
and crap that just had to be had due to the 
manufactured consent 
of the marketeers.


We ARE a nation of crap mongers. 


Our whole economy is based on
producing, marketing and buying crap. 


Its one big crap swap.




I think I have strayed from my point if I did actually have one when I started.


Oh yes. Assholes.


Now this new job is a very good experience for me.


It gives me a chance to work on many areas of my life that require humility
and to let go. To stop being a control freak.


I have such difficulty dealing with the 
rudeness, the arrogance and the plain stupidity of others.


So as I practice, I serve the public 
as the arbiter of the unwanted back to the wanted.


One man's crap is another man's crap. That's not how it goes but that's how it is. 


Im a minimalist. This was not always the case.


It's ironic or devine intervention that a minimalist 
would end up working everyday in the recycling of junk to treasure business.


I'm grateful that it reminds me of my choice to reduce the weight of objects in my life.


I'm grateful that I can practice humility when:


a donor has to hold their piece of crap so gingerly in their hands and tell me how valuable and useful this piece of crap is to someone else.


(i'm thinking if its so great why dont they just keep it or hey if they are giving it away then just let go. Just shut the fuck up and let me toss into a bin full of more crap just like it. There is a line of assholes right behind you mister and the crap is piling up. So let me be on my way as  should you.)


Or,


A donor tells me how the pieces fit together and how they cant be separated.
( I'm thinking, do you not see these bins piled full of junk, do you not see how everything is just dumped in these bins, do you think that this plastic piece of junk is so great that I should ignore the line of cars piling up, one by one, just so I can secure your child's filthy, sticky  soon to be former toy in a special place so that when it is shipped to the store to be resold it will arrive with a fanfare? 
Ta fucking Dah!)


Or, 


A donor says maybe you should......
( Now when they start their sentence like that they are really being an asshole. That is always a sentence that comes from a woman, stating the obvious or with a suggestion of how to take care of those shoes, that lamp or the box in her car. Its hot, I'm tired, sweaty and hungry and I really don't need someone telling me how to do something that would be totally against what I was trained and am required to do in this job. That's not how its done. Let it go. You donated it. It's not yours to cherish, polish, dust, hold, view, wear, worship or whatever anymore.)


Or, 


a donnor drives up talking on the phone and just sits there. I come up to the window, they dont roll it down, but they stick up a finger to say in such a kind gesture, "One moment please, can't you see I'm on the phone." Oh what an asshole. We have to stand around and wait until she is done. Yes let's just fall behind in our work so she can finish buying more crap or whatever she is doing on her cell phone.


There are plenty more ors where I am coming from.


And truly,  I am no different from anyone else.


I am guilty of ignorance or over helpfulness or rudeness to my fellow earthlings.


And I understand that most of the time our being an asshole is due to the fact
that we are so bogged down surviving the struggle of the
American Dream, succumbing to our fears and insecurities
that we forget to relax, to be focused and to care for others.


I get that.


So each day I get a chance to see what others feel like


when I AM being



an asshole.