The Handwriting’s On The Wall

My first real graphic design job was at this tiny, tiny family-owned magazine: a couple and their son.

One day, the wife gave me a printed-out Excel sheet with a handwritten list of names and phone numbers that I was supposed to add. Because it was handwritten, some of the names were hard to make out. At this point, I knew asking her questions was kind of pointless because she never had an answer for anything, so I tried to make out the names as well as I could and sent her the new copy.

She then came out to my desk to tell me I had spelled one of the names wrong.

Client: “That name needs a U.”

Me: “Oh, sure. Where does the U go in the name?”

Client: “I don’t know.”

Me: “Could you rewrite it for me so I can make it out a little better? I was having a hard time reading this handwriting.”

Client: “I don’t have time to write it down. That’s ridiculous.”

Me: “Well, I’m not familiar with the name and you are. If I’ve misspelled it, then wouldn’t it be easiest if you gave me the correct spelling?”

Client: “That’s ridiculous.”

She stormed off to her office and left me wondering where the h*** I was supposed to put the U. I tried reading the chicken scratch that was apparently so time-intensive that it would be absurd to do it again.

Five minutes later, she called me into her office with her husband. They started to yell at me about how ridiculous it was that I had asked her to rewrite something.

Client: “I don’t have time to help you do something you should already know! No one, ever, in my whole career has asked me to rewrite something for them. If you’re not professional enough to do it by yourself, then why did we hire you?”

I’m a super emotional person and cry when I’m very angry, and her attacking me personally was making it really hard to talk. That made them chastise me for getting upset. However, as upset as it made me, I couldn’t help that it was the most bonkers thing for someone to get mad about. 

Oh, and this all happened on my birthday. Yay!