My day got off to a bad start. I go to this bakery to get coffee and a pastry. The bill comes to $6.19. I give him a ten and he gives me back some bills and 30 cents change. I says:
“Um, I think you got that wrong. My bill is $6.19 and you gave me 30 cents change.”
He looks at the bill and says: “No. I got it right. Your change is $4.30.”
I says: “That can’t be right. My bill is $6.19. I should get 81 cents change.”
He says: “No you’re wrong. Look at the receipt.” He shows me the paper receipt. “It says you get $4.30 in change.”
I says: “Well that can’t be right. Look at the bill. It says $6.19 on the bottom. One dollar minus 19 cents is 81 cents. Right?? Not 30 cents.”
We go back and forth about this several more times. Each one of us telling the other that they’re wrong. I start to get mad, there’s an edge to my voice (I haven’t had my morning coffee yet so all bets are off). I start to wonder if I’m losing my mind. Maybe one dollar minus 19 cents really is 30 cents. The woman waiting on line behind me butts in with her two-cents. And I have to restrain myself from turning around and facing her and saying: “Would you mind your own business,” and then throttling her until she’s dead. By this point everybody in the bakery is looking at me.
Finally the manager comes over to sort it out. She studies the receipt, circles some numbers. “Oh that’s it,” she says. “The pastry was on sale. That didn’t register on the bill but it registered on the change.” Now I’m totally confused, but I’m realizing that he probably gave me back MORE change than I thought, not less. I hadn’t even noticed whether he had given me four bills or three. All I noticed was that the bill didn’t match up with the change.
“Whatever,” I said. “I really don’t care.” And I really don’t care about the money. What I cared about was the confusion and the frustration I’d been subjected to. “You can just keep the change.” I leave the 30 cents sitting there on the counter and go fix my coffee.
Life can be like a weird little series of one-act plays where we write our own lines on the spot. The End.
Ace Backwords 