No One Knows What Patience Means Anymore

I work at a small booth in a tourist area. The booth is part of a larger marketplace that opens at 10:00 am. This particular morning, the bus system was running late, so I didn’t show up to open until 10:15. Additionally, my boss wanted me to do last night’s register report. Before we open, all of our merchandise is covered by bedsheets and the lights are all off. I kept it this way while I did the report so no one would think that we were open yet, as customers were around looking at other booths.

As I was sitting there, a man and his daughter walked up and started picking up the bedsheets themselves to look at our stuff. I didn’t notice until they walked up to the register, which was very obviously off and still covered with a bedsheet, as well.

The guy tried to hand me what they wanted to buy without even acknowledging me. I started to explain that we were not open yet, and before I could ask him to give me a few minutes, he threw the merch down on the bedsheet and stomped off.

The part that really upsets me is that he emailed the company and tried to say that I was an hour late — my timestamp says otherwise — and refused him service. Thankfully, my boss was understanding.