Life's little annoyances

The supermarket needs a fast check-out line with a sign that says "For REALLY impatient people who are REALLY in a hurry & who DEFINITELY have 14 or fewer items & who can pay WITHOUT complica-tions." And it should only be staffed by cashiers who are REALLY fast; none of this la-de-dah-I've-got-all-the-time-in-the-world business; none of this chat-the-customer-up-show-him-how-friendly-you-are business.

As you can no doubt surmise from the above I just returned from the supermarket where once again I found myself in a "fast" check-out line that was anything but. When I first got in line the other two fast lanes that were open were just as long; but then two others were suddenly opened up, and all the people behind me and at the ends of the other two lines swarmed to the new opportunities. I couldn't join the swarm without trampling over the people in the line next to me.

And then, as I stood there, I saw that all the other lines, new and old, were moving forward steadily, whereas my line had not moved an iota since I got in it. The couple at the front of the line evidently had a payment difficulty -- credit card wouldn't approve the payment or some such nonsense. And the little cashier was of the slow as molasses in December variety, so that even when the first couple finally got their difficulties straightened out and departed, plastic bags in hand, it took forever for her to take care of the next customer, and the next (behind whom I stood). Although it has been my experience that as soon as I change lanes, that lane freezes, and the one I was in originally suddenly grows wings, I finally couldn't take it another minute, especially when I saw that one of the new lanes was now completely empty, had taken care of all the people who had been behind me, and then some. I walked briskly over, plopped my environmentally-friendly bag of groceries down and began emptying it, was briskly tallied and re-bagged by the efficient cashier, and walked out of the place just half a minute before the women who had been behind me in the original line.

I know that my impatience is one of my least attractive -- and most noticeable -- attributes. I suspect that the gods that be throw slow check-out lines, along with slow cars on the roads, in my path, to test my patience, to (presumably) encourage me to develop greater patience. I keep telling them this is a complete waste of everybody's valuable time. This is a character flaw I don't even seem inclined to try to curb. Whenever I am doing something I don't want to do -- like drive, like stand in line at the supermarket or the drug store, like cook -- I am impatient to just get this over with. But the indifferent cosmos rolls on at its own immutable clip, and I am left to fume and be rude if given half a chance.

That's life.