Thauma-Trauma
I used to work at a science museum. It’s near a major airport, so although the museum is not well-known, we’d often get visitors from around the world. Sadly, I think the woman in my story is a local.
I was stationed at an exhibit that is changed out regularly to accommodate STEM activities for kids and adults. This time, we had materials set out for making thaumatropes. (Like two-picture flip books, these old-timey toys consist of a paper circle suspended between two strings. You draw related pictures on one side, e.g., a bird and a cage, or a hand and a ball, and when you twist the strings, the two pictures flip fast enough to combine into one complex image.
Since the thaumatrope flips over and over like a coin, it works best when both images are oriented towards the artist. This can be hard to explain, especially to little kids, but simple to demonstrate. One of the most common mistakes people made was orienting their pictures the wrong way. They’d draw on one side, flip the paper circle over sideways like a test in school, and draw again. Luckily, we had almost unlimited materials, and guests were quick to test out their thaumatropes and laugh at how they’d oriented the drawings wrong before starting over. This is a familiar part of the scientific process, of course: testing out a device, and making adjustments to meet the goal you have in mind.
Usually, we have one to three staff at this exhibit, but mornings were slow at this museum, and I was the only one there. Museum policy dictated that I had to stay by the entrance to welcome or entice folks in, explain the activity, and allow them free rein to create as they pleased. If I had time between guests, or if the exhibit reached capacity, I could do a lap to check in with each group, help with projects, and so on.
The museum opened around 9:00 AM, and it wasn’t long before one of the guests I’d welcomed, a young woman with an eight-or-nine-year old boy in tow, came stomping up to me from a table at the back of the exhibit.
Woman: “YOU NEED TO DO YOUR JOB.”
Me: “Hello, again, is there something I can help you with?”
Woman: “YES. My SON drew this thing upside-down, and now it doesn’t WORK right. You need to share your LEARNINGS with everyone so we don’t waste our TIME with you!”
Yes, she said “learnings,” plural. As far as I could tell, she was a native English speaker, so this odd choice left me more bemused than offended. Before I could commiserate with her about the mistake or point her towards a fresh piece of paper, she dragged the embarrassed-looking boy past me and over to the next exhibit.
When I was relieved for break about ten minutes later, both my supervisor and HIS supervisor were waiting in the break room to check on me; it turned out other guests had heard the woman yelling and alerted a staff member. I reassured them I was okay, more puzzled by her behavior than hurt or angry.
When I returned to my exhibit after break (supervisor hovering protectively, with the woman and child still nearby), I found a jacket someone had left behind and immediately recognized it as hers.
Me: “Maybe one of us should bring it over to her?”
Supervisor: *Tossing the jacket over his arm.* “I’ll bring it up to Lost and Found. She can claim it later.”
Lost and Found was on the third floor of the museum. We were on the ground floor. The elevators were broken. I hope her learnings included a three-floor hike up steep utility stairs.
