I went shopping today. I didnt really feel up to it. Im still recovering from flu. But they had three excellent priced sale items that I wanted to buy, not for myself but two for the food bank and one for the animal shelter, ant the sale ends today, so I went. They have this gift program at the store where they give you stickers to save and you can redeem them (when you get enough) for these really nice pots and pans(fancy, light-weight, stainless steel, well-made ones). I want to get a couple for my Mom. Now, it would be easy(but expensive) to just go out and buy them at full price. But thats not the way I was raised. We never bought anything fancy, not for the house, not for ourselves. My Mom raised us and taught us that it was more important to buy and give to those in need than it was to get ourselves fancy cookware or clothes. So as you can guess, my clothing is clean and functional, but not fancy or in style. I dont wear make-up or jewelry, but instead a baseball hat to help shade my light-sensitive eyes. I look like what I am a lower-income, country tomboy who has gotten overweight over the years and has to wear compression gloves and hats. i dont fit anyones description of pretty. But I am very blessed, I have friends and family who know me, accept me, and love me as I am. But there are days like today when i get a wake-up call about how people in my community and society who dont know me, see, think, and feel about me. At the grocery store, people who dont collect those stickers often leave the ones they earn at the register for people behind them who do save them. Ive never yet got any of these freebies. But today in that store, the three people ahead of me in line all left their stickers and when it was my turn they were all there for the taking and as I reached for that stack I said to the register lady( a young 20 something women) Is it okay if I have these? She reached out and took them, looked me up and down slowly, turned around and looked at the pretty lady with nice clothes and jewelry and an adorable toddler boy in the lane behind her. And then she tapped that lady on the shoulder, and gave all those stickers to her. I was shocked speechless. I paid my tab and she gave me the exact amount of tickets I had earned, not even ONE EXTRA, and I left. It took me the whole drive home (thirty minutes) to realize that she had done this because she saw me as a worthless person, a middle-aged, overweight, individual that didnt even deserve common respect or decency. I know and accept who I am. I am grateful for my friends and family who love me as I am. But I cant even describe how much it hurts when people in my community do something like this to me. So please all of you out there, when you see someone like me, some average, unimportant, ignorable person, please say something nice to us, smile, or at least treat us with respect. Because there are a lot of people out there who dont and sometimes their actions hurt so much. Sometimes it has us driving up our driveway through a fog or tears, sometimes it makes us wonder, Is this why nothing has gone right in my life? Is this why I fail? Do i wear an invisible sticker that proclaims me un-worthy? So please, be kind to people like me, we have our friends and families, but our communities, the people around us can either make our day or ruin it.
Posted on: Sun, 16 Nov 2014 19:17:22 +0000
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