An Open Letter to a Very Important Person
Dear Ms. Important Lady,
Judging by your very expensive suit, perfectly coordinated and equally expensive accessories, and very tastefully done highlights and coif, you must be somebody VERY important. No, really. I totally mean that.
But I’m still confused about why you’re out doing your own menial tasks, you know, like going to the post office. Did your assistant call in sick today? Perhaps that’s the reason for your extremely rude behavior…?
But hey, I get it. I know doing something as pedestrian as mailing an envelope must be terribly vexing for you. Having to be around so many of us average folk; the little people of the world…it’s unthinkable!
However, when a woman carrying a 30lb toddler with one arm and a fairly sizable and unwieldy box with the other arm goes out of her way to keep the door open for you, you might want to be a bit more gracious.
I could have let it close and hit you in your pointy, rodent-like face but I didn’t. Adding insult to injury, when I started to drop my box in the course of being polite to you, did you even stop to help? No.
Did you even bother to say thank you? No.
Seriously, lady. I had a child in one arm and a box in the other. You should have been helping ME and you did nothing but breeze past like I was your personal doorman.
So, I hope you were appropriately embarrassed when I said “YOU’RE WELCOME!” and perhaps you even heard me mutter a nasty name as you kept walking; leaving me in the wake of your self-importance and stinky perfume.
But just so you know… You’re not going to turn me into a rude self-involved asshat like yourself. No. I’m going to keep holding doors for people and thanking people when they do it for me and I’ll continue to model good manners and graciousness for my children. Except when I feel compelled to utter a nasty name about someone as rude and inconsiderate as yourself, of course.
As for you… I do believe in karma. You’ll get your comeuppance eventually. With any luck, it will hit you right in your pointy rodent-like face.
Yours in Better Manners,
IzzyMom
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Believe it or not…this sort of thing happened to me twice in one week. The second time was at a restaurant.
I had to go out to the car to change a diaper (a mother’s work is NEVER done, is it?) and as I was coming back inside with my son on my hip, I waited and held the door for the woman about five feet behind me and she didn’t say thank you either.
But I still said “You’re welcome!” and I said it in the most sickeningly sweet sing-song voice. I’m sure she got the message. Bitch.
I hate people like that. Ugh.
Love that. You are so right. What the hell is with people?
You’re a much better person than the two of them COMBINED.
And, you’re right. They’ll get theirs one day.
Huh, I think I ran into this woman in a museum Saturday. I’m still annoyed. Effing a’s.
You are hilarious, Izzy. I do exactly the same thing. Though my phrase is usually “No problem!”
But I assure you that I always leap to help people with babies and strollers in and out of doors, down steps, etc. I mean, how hard is THAT?
I can’t even tell you how many times stuff like that happened to me when I was pregnant (each time). Waiting in a line at the store, hugely pregnant with a toddler in one arm, when another register opens up and the “gentleman” behind me in line just about knocks me down trying to get there first.
Thankfully, the sales clerk said to him “I’ll ring her up first,” pointing to me.
I do the same thing, I always holler out, “Oh, you’re WELCOME!” when they don’t say thanks. It’s just good manners to thank someone for holding the door - I’ve been with my husband for over eight years and I still say thank you when he holds the door.
That’s it. I’m starting a website for shaming child-hating tards and other ignorant dicks. DontBeADick.com
Seriously.
A few weeks ago a man walking into the child care at the gym RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME didn’t hold the door for me and I was pusing a 35lb. double-stroller with two kids in it. At a child care no less! I figure he’ll get his. I don’t know in which life time, but he’ll get it!
I ran into one of these rude people just the other day at Target. Why is it so hard for some people to be nice and gracious? I guess I’ll just leave it up to karma.
I love the sickly sweet voice. It’s your friend.
This happens to me ALL THE TIME in rude-ass So Fla. HATE. I too say you’re welcome - sometimes fakely sweet, other times sarcastically - and then don’t bother to lower my voice as I discuss with others how rude and thoughtless and special people think they are. I live in the land of “I’m better than everyone else and the rules don’t apply to me” - UGH.
people like that are just gross.
AARRGGGHH. What is wrong with people?! Just last week (while trying to hold a squirmy toddler myself), I offered to let a grumpy woman with a couple of items cut in front of me. She rolled her eyes, let out a loud exhale, and breezed past me. No “thank you”, nothing. What a horrible person. She must have been jealous of my cute flats. ;)
The slightly too loud YOU’RE WELCOME is my stock resaponse too. I figure the hear it, even if the don’t acknowledge it. For what it’s worth my building even has a doorman who just watches when I’m juggling two kids, a dog, and the front door. Ass.
I got cut off by some crazy woman in the grocery store who thought we must’ve been on Rt 66. Good lord I wanted to kill her. Why do you cut people off with a shopping cart in a grocery store? I mean, really. I just don’t get it.
i love that you said YOU’RE WELCOME and i hope you called her a BITCH or a CUNTRAG under your breath. :)
Why do people have to be so rude! Ugh! She probably had something shoved way up her ass, that’s really the only explanation!
Sometimes people are so rude! When I had infant twin babies, and a 2 year old, people would let go of doors and leave me to manage it all on my own. I thank people like you, because without them I would have had a really hard time with all of that. Good for you for calling her on her rudeness, and good for you for continuing to be helpful regardless of how people take advantage.
I do the same thing–chirp “YOU’RE WELCOME!” to the retreating backs of the asshats.
And I still hold the doors too…I even check behind me when I walk out of a door so that I don’t let it swing shut on someone. A little tiny bit of manners is all it takes…but some people don’t even have that. *sigh*.
I would totally hold the door for you. :)
I always assume people like that don’t have kids. Either that or they’ve had a team of nannies take care of their kids and they have a personal assistant at work.
Rudeness! It sucks!!!!
p.s. I have to ship some things for eBay and I will totally rearrange my afternoon in order to not take my girls with me to the post office. ;)
God, people are rude.
I am the person that actually picks up my step when I see someone is going to hold the door open for me. And if carrying my toddler, I ask my tot to say Thank you.
Teaching manners and bieng courteous at the same time. Do you see the halo above my head? Yes, I am that perfect.
Hope you did not use the “C” word…
See, that’s when you wish there were a perfectly-placed banana peel on the floor so that the first person breezing through would slip and fall on their pompous ass =)
I always run over to hold doors open or help with packages and it’s just amazing how many times people will treat you like, “, But of course you shall assist me, thou art a but a peasant after all”. That’s OK, that’s “when allergies attack”, and I bust out the “b*tch!” sneeze!
Saying “Thank You” is so last millenium!
So glad I’m not the only one who says you’re welcome loudly like that. you could even incorporate the kiddo - see, when mummy holds the door open for someone, they say “thank you” and then you can “you’re welcome.” He he he. Hope you run into a bunch of polite people this week.
I hope YOU DID use the C word.
I love to club people with it.
This has happened so many times to me as well. I DESPISE people who act above others. I find it hard to keep my gracious manners to myself and only reply with “you’re welcome”….but I know killing them with kindness is sometimes the best medicine.
I hate that! Recently I was walking toward the library when two boys, aged somewhere between 16 and 20, ran right in front of me as I approached the door. I thought perhaps they were making sure they could hold it open for me. Silly, aren’t I? Nope, they just wanted to beat me to the door and they didn’t even hold it open for me as I followed them inside. Asshats!
My kids will hold doors open for people, especially elderly people, and when the person doesn’t not thank them, I’ll thank my kids loudly and say, “Well, I’m glad you’re learning your manners, even if other people never learned them from their moms.” My kids always get a snicker out of that one.
I had that happen to me recently. I was entering a restaurant as another couple were leaving. I held the door. They just waltzed right thru, no thank you, no nothing. I did the sing-song “You’re welcome,” thing, with an added “It’s customary to tip the doorman!” hollered after them for good measure.
People really suck sometimes.
I’m sure, though, if you or your children did not demonstrate ood manners to her, she’d have something acid to say about it…
Listen, if you’re going to insist on bringing out some squirmy little toddler as well as block my way with your parcel then you can just kiss my couture ass. I don’t “do” door holding, and I’ll be writing the post office as strongly worded letter letting them know it is unconscionable that they expect people to operate the doors themselves.
Now excuse me, I have to call my apartment and let the help know I’m on my way home and to make sure my husband’s boyfriend is out of the house. ;-)
Love your blog.
Ahahahaha…BEST. COMMENT. EVER!
That seems to happen a lot more these days.
It’s just sad how people are becoming more inconsiderate…
Geeawd! You’re a good person. As you know I’m the last person to comment on this behavior. Remember that post I wrote about the parking lady? http://www.valuewit.com/2007/02/parking_etiquet.html
Sometimes I go out in my invisibility cloak too!
When I worked in retail I had a regular customer like that and I used to just kill her with kindness. The look on her face was great… like a “oh I am being a bitch” reality check.
God, what is it with people?? Can’t they manage to get the sticks out of their asses for 2 seconds to say “thank you”? Geesh.
RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR! I should really get me a blog. I could write a manifesto. I hate those people and those other f–kers, who I wave nicely out in front of me in traffic and they act like it was their right of way to begin with. Just today a woman was entering the library as I was trying to walk out with a stack of books and two children and she literally let ME APOLOGIZE for being in her way as she walked in with her one child. I thought you were suppose to yield to the person leaving the building (and elevators) before pushing your way through the door.
My assumption is that most people are just so completely self-absorbed they think the rest of the world should be absorbed in them, too.
Good for you for uttering “you’re welcome”, I hope they get embarrassed but I’m sure they don’t, b/c people like that are just plain rude and clueless.
Way to go by being the bigger person..
And as for them and the occasional utterance of explitives…. “Fucktards!”
I just don’t get people sometimes. I run into these people daily, especially when I am trying to get thru a door with a stroller and a 27 lb infant/toddler.
I’ve so had that happen to me!!!! Too much frankly. I like to “kill them with (sarcastic) kindness” by saying “Thank you!” if they don’t hold the door for me, my daughters and our stroller or “You’re welcome!” if they breeze on by us holding the door for them. Ugh!!!!! But like you, I keep holding those doors. Why stoop to their level when I can be self-righteous and point out the error of their ways? :)
Thanks for posting this … I was just ranting about the same thing earlier. I’m working as a pianist at a summer music camp, and just last night held a door open for some little percussionists and their equipment … their teacher, an older man, waltzed right through the door behind them without looking at or acknowledging me. And I’m f***ing PREGNANT!
Our society is amazingly coarse. It is a somewhat satisfying thing to believe in karma, that all these rude fuckers will someday get theirs, like they’ve become a character in a Carl Hiassen novel. Oh, if life was only like that!