Nobody Puts Baby In A Box

In Ontario, they have done away with plastic shopping bags. I’m in a dollar store with my six-year-old daughter, and as always, I’ve left my reusable shopping bags in the car.

Cashier: “You can take a box from the pile at the front.”

I send my daughter to pick a box. She picks one with a picture of a toy on it, and it is bigger than needed. I don’t care. The cashier does.

Cashier: *To my daughter, in a rude tone* “That box is too big! Pick the one beside it.”

[Daughter]’s face falls, and she looks so crestfallen. She puts back the box she picked, does not pick another one, and just walks over to me, all sad.

I get the momma bear look on my face and stare at the cashier, who goes over and picks up the smaller box. When she sees my face, she puts down the small box.

Me: *To my daughter* “Go pick the box you want.”

She happily skipped over and got it. The cashier said nothing for the rest of the transaction.

When we got home, the box was turned into a house for one of [Daughter]’s toys.

The moral of the story: let a kid pick whatever box they want… or give out shopping bags again.