I work in retail, and while I enjoy my job, there are times when the dullness simply sets in.
Everything becomes a pattern of tagging clothes, ringing up customers, greeting those who come in. This may be one of the reasons I've developed a slight addiction to the cupcakes from the cupcake shop across the street. It's such a bad idea to have one of those in walking distance of me, but it keeps my coffee addiction at bay. The coffee shop is right next door too, much closer and convenient but I can't give in.
So my days are driven by cupcakes and coffee desires, looks at the clock and baskets of interesting items to rifle through. Being a consignment shop, we always get something pretty interesting to break the mold of retail retell. Customers too add more spice to the day. For some reason, on this day, of all days, I decided to spice it up even more.
Greeting has become so natural: door creaks open, "Hello! Welcome to Hand Me Up's!" Or when a customer comes close enough to the counter, "Hi! How are you?" Of course everything must be said in that perky, customer-service tone that is second nature now.
The customer always says how fine they are, repeats the sentiments, and I do my best to use my mental thesaurus to give the same impression. Then, we go back to our prospective duties of shopping and working.
But this time, for some reason, the customer and I were on the same time frame, simultaneously greeting and asking after one another's well-being so quickly, I didn't have time to react. I jinxed her.
There was an awful two seconds of her smiling blankly at me, before asking me "what?" She was so nice about it, but you could just tell she was confused. I made things worst by trying to explain it, which only confused her more, so I just faded out of my speech of how she owed me a soda. She backed away, smiling.
