“Hey Dude”

“Hey, dude, how long will it take to…”

“Do not call me ‘dude’. You need to call me ‘Sir’”, he said cutting me off. The look in eyes matched his tone and confirmed he was legitimately pissed off. A little annoyed and largely intimidated, I faked a sarcastic smirk and walk away without finishing my question. At least, that’s how I remember it.

This took place at my high school when I was 17. The man I was speaking with worked for the company that was contracted to provide class rings for the school. He and a few other co-workers had set up a booth in the common area and were assisting soon-to-be seniors with the purchase of their class rings. I had asked the man a few basic questions earlier and had now come back by for one last piece of information. As I recall, I hadn’t been particularly rude to the guy, nor had I done anything deliberately disrespectful. He had previously come across as calm and level, both in terms of his assistance and demeanor. Now this interaction took place and left me somewhat confused as to what I had done.

As I’d thought about our exchange over the next hour, it became fairly obvious what had happened. I had come across as disrespectful, though unintentionally, and the man wasn’t going to tolerate it. From his perspective, he being my elder out-ranked me being the customer and he wasn’t going to listen to an idiot kid speak “down” to him in the least bit. Even though that hadn’t been my intention, I saw how it had appeared that way.

At the time, that’s as deep as I saw the issue. He was a grumpy adult with a quick fuse on disrespect issues. That wasn’t anything abnormal. The school was littered teachers and administrators who’d be quick to correct you should you ever forget to include a “sir” or “mam” in your discourse with them. “It’s not, ‘Yes’. It’s, ‘Yes, Mam!’”. I lumped him into that group, chalked him up as a jerk and felt a degree of anger towards him for making me feel like rude, punk kid, regardless of whether I had acted like one or not.

I found it strange when I remembered that story last week, 13 years after it had happened. Following the initial incident, I’d probably thought about the situation for another day or two before it faded from my mind. Now, well over a decade later, the details came back to me in perfect clarity. Since starting this job, my dislike for it has grown by the day. In fact, if I don’t hate what I am doing, then I’d have to say I have never truly hated anything. The job is mundane and of little importance, and could be performed by virtually anyone, as it requires little intelligence. Most of all, I feel silly and defeated for having it. Thus, my real problem isn’t necessarily with the job, my problem is me and my feelings towards myself in this job. Nonetheless, each day I swallow my pride and perform my duties, regardless of how I feel about them.

Each day these duties entail a number of different task: from opening new checking accounts, establishing safe deposit boxes for people, filling out stacks of paper work or performing whatever flavor of the month sales calling methods management has rolled out. No matter the task, I go through the motions and perform whatever is required of me. On this particular day, that meant I was opening a checking account for Kyle, a 16-year-old kid who’d come into the bank with his mom. She did most of the talking, informing me that Kyle needed an account of his own since he would be working this summer. She told me how she and her husband wanted Kyle to start learning some financial responsibility and with this new account he would have access to his money, however, she would still be able to monitor his spending. This entire conversation took place while Kyle sat in the chair next to us, with his ear buds in while he tooled away at his iPod. Never once did he look up or contribute to the conversation nor did his mom ever encourage him to do so.

I began the process while pretending to care and Kyle’s mom provided me with all the necessary personal information I needed on Kyle. SSN, birthday, email, all of those things were recited by the mom. Finally, I needed a contact number and Kyle’s mom blushed and informed me that Kyle had just gotten a new phone two days ago and she didn’t have the new number memorized yet. Thus, we finally needed Kyle’s participation. As his mom patted him on the knee and he reluctantly took out one of his ear buds, I asked him for his cell number. With an annoyed look, Kyle shot me an exaggerated “Whaaat?”, although it was obvious he had heard me. What he was really saying was “You are annoying me”, but he conveyed it through an obnoxious “what?”. Once I repeated the question, he spat out his number while shaking his head as if disapproving of my judgement in bothering him.

It was at that very moment, that I remembered the ring guy from 13 year earlier. “Do not call me dude!”, rang through my head clear as a bell. I wanted to reach across the desk and punch Kyle in the throat, the same way the ring guy had wanted to slap me all those years ago. Unfortunately, there was no recourse in my situation. The mom saw nothing wrong with her son’s behavior so I couldn’t really chastise him. Had I made any comment, the mom would have taken it straight to my manager and created a mess that wasn’t worth dealing with. So, I just nodded at Kyle, finished my work and got them on their way.

After they left, I thought more about the ring guy. Back when I’d call him a dude, I pictured him as some jerk who was a discipline freak and walked around with continual chip on his shoulder. But now, I realized hadn’t been the case. For the most part, he hadn’t been that pissed at me specifically. I’m sure he’d been called a dude before and wasn’t horribly offended by it. He was most likely just miserable at his job. There he was, in a high school commons area, selling class rings to a bunch of teenagers. I imagine he was miserable everyday, setting up his displays and having to act friendly to kids half his age who either ignored him or made him the butt of their jokes. He knew all too well that he had a shitty job and I’m sure he hated it with a passion. And then I came along, just as Kyle had, and gave him one more reason to detest his job and he couldn’t help but lash out at me. I understood now, although much later than I should have.