The Blogtastic Blogfest That Is Getmeoutofthis.net!

Debated whether or not to write about this because I feel like it makes me an asshole. But whatever. I can trust you, right blog? You understand me, right? So I’m going to talk this out, and we’ll see where it goes. If you don’t like me being extremely personal and diary-like, this is not a day to read this blog, I guess. Come back later! Anyway…

At work, we often have coupons going on. By often I mean “always.” Over the past few days, we had a “friends and family” coupon going on, that we were supposed to give out to, you know, friends and family. Of course, we have some at all the registers in case people forget theirs. We do this for all our coupons.

Basically, though, this leads most people to just automatically ask “do you have any coupons I can use?” any time they come up to the register. Which is fine, I suppose. Kohl’s would much rather have them come in thinking “well, surely they have a coupon so it’s okay to shop” than not. When they ask, there’s nothing wrong with giving them the coupon. It doesn’t hurt me for Kohl’s not to make as much money, and it makes the customers happier, so I guess there’s that.

But there’s a part of me that’s kind of annoyed at the assumption that there’s always going to be a coupon there, and I’m not totally sure why. I think it’s the way in which a lot of people ask me for it, like they deserve a coupon and will be unhappy without it, instead of wondering if I have an extra bonus for them. It’s a difference between “hey, do you think you could do me a favor?” and “give me my discount, slave.”

The point is, all weekend, I’ve been telling people there are no coupons. Not every person. Whenever someone met criteria I didn’t quite understand I’d tell them about it, and get them their discount. Like, if they made a mistake, and pulled out their coupon for later this week, and looked sad instead of upset, or took the news well, then I’d offer them the other coupon instead. If nothing about them struck me as whatever, I didn’t mention its existence unless specifically asked for that coupon. Then I pulled it out, of course. I wasn’t about to get in trouble. But I held the power of 20% off in my paws, and I wielded it like I wanted.

The way it happens, though, is just… strange. It really is an almost subconscious decision. I’d smile at the customer and immediately fall into one of those two roles, and I could not break from it at that point, even if I wanted to. I couldn’t ruin the illusion. The lie. Even when there wasn’t any lie. It was so much faking it, something I’ve done so much of in my life, and have worked hard to get rid of. But here was a chance to do that, with no consequences and no reason not to, and I jumped on it. I jumped on it, and wielded this stupidest of lies to keep a barrier between me and these people who are all nice enough, and whom I have no ill-will towards, but who love to punch me in the gut and knock the wind out of me with mentions of me off-hand to their kids, for example.

Believe it or not, I like customer service. I like interacting with people, and the vast majority of people I see every day are awesome, nice people. I don’t mind working the register at all. But my own problems get wrapped up in these interactions. People I may never see again don’t know what they’re getting into and what they’re doing to me emotionally. So I keep coupons from them in order to feel distance from them so I don’t feel as hurt. I guess that’s basically the scenario I have talked through here. Maybe I should be doing other things to protect myself. Maybe I should be going overboard with my appearance so there’s no fucking way anyone could make a mistake. I don’t know. It’s silly to take it out on others, even with something as trivial as a coupon. I should really stop that.