When I was a little girl I remember going through the drive-thru at a Roy Rogers. My mom ordered one of the chicken strip meals with all dark meat like she had many times before. But this time they wouldn’t let her get all dark meat. This time it was only white meat or something. [The details are a little sketchy since I was like 12 years old at the time.] My mom was pretty upset by that. She began yelling at the poor girl on the other end of the speaker, telling her she’s always gotten it that way before. I don’t remember if Mom changed her order or what, but I know we ended up at the drive-thru window where my mom then continued to berate the young drive-up girl. I was so embarrassed I wanted to hide under my seat.

Since then, over the last twenty-some years, I’ve seen my mom bring several more waiters and waitresses to tears. She’s a very good tipper when the service is good. But when the service is bad, there is hell to pay. When she’s mad you know about it. In fact people ten tables over know about it. It’s just something I’ve learned to live with. Now that I’m no longer a teenager worrying about what every single person on this Earth thinks of me, I’m not as easily embarrassed by it.

Fast forward to tonight.

We have season tickets to our local community theatre. And tonight there was a show. It was me, my mom, my grandma, Keaton and Justis. We got there early [like usual] and nestled in to our row E seats to peruse the program.

Then an usher came down the aisle with two people trailing. She looked at me. She checked the tickets again. Then she looked at me again. Finally she asked me what seat my ticket had. I said, “We have E-2, E-4, E-6, E-8, and E-10.” She looked confused and then walked away.

A few minutes later a different usher came down the other aisle with a different couple and he also looked confused. He asked my mom if he could see our tickets. She handed them to him. He looked them over. We did indeed have those seats. But then he looked closer. We were at the 7:30 performance, but our tickets were for the 10:30 performance. My mom was livid and she let the usher know.

I remember when we ordered the tickets. Back in June. We talked about the two performances. My mom and I said if it was just the two of us we would probably go to the 10:30 performance, but with Grandma and the kids we thought the 7:30 performance would be best. So we were pretty confident she did not order tickets for the 10:30 performance.

A couple minutes later a woman came over to talk to my mom. My mom forcefully told her she did not order 10:30 tickets. The woman said she would go look at the order, but we have tickets for the 10:30 show and we would have to give up our seats to the people who had 7:30 tickets.

Grandma and I got up and followed the lady to check the order. Turns out my mom did not circle 10:30. But she also didn’t circle 7:30. She had left it blank. So the blame lied equally on my mom for not picking a time and the theater for just assuming 10:30 rather than calling to confirm.

The show was sold out so our only option was to come back at 10:30. My grandma told the woman she wanted the Director [who Grandma knows] to call her first thing Monday because we would not be at the 10:30 show and she wanted a full refund. The woman said she was sure there wouldn’t be a problem with that.

Then the woman checked one more time and was able to find five seats; three together and two singles that were one right in front of the other. She was able to get these seats because the people who work there graciously gave up their seats [including this woman] to accommodate us. The seats weren’t as good as our ticketed seats, but at least we would be able to see the show.

So we walked back to give mom the news. My mom was furious. She was screaming at this woman. “I drove all the way from Chicago for this. I’ve had season tickets for four years. I’ve given a lot of money to this theater.” And on and on.

Like I said, I’ve just gotten used to these displays so I just walked off to find our new seats. The three seats together were in the back row [it's a small theater though so you can still see well from there]. I turned to Keaton and asked him if he’d like to sit there. I could see he was on the verge of tears as he said, “I just want to go home.”

And that’s when it hit me. I felt like I was teenage girl again. I immediately remembered what it felt like to be in the middle of one of my mom’s temper tantrums. It was torture. And there was Keaton feeling exactly what I felt twenty years ago at Roy Rogers. And I wasn’t doing anything to protect him. My heart was breaking for him. I wanted to leave too. But in the end we decided to stay and watch the show.

However, I think the spectacle that happened prior to the show put a big damper on it for Keaton.

I can easily lose my temper when I feel I’m being wronged. I guess it’s a trait I inherited from my mother. But, especially after tonight, I’ve realized it’s something I definitely have to learn to control.

Yes the theater was wrong. But we were partially to blame as well. And nothing was gained by abusing this woman at the theater. In fact I think my grandma’s calm demeanor was what helped get us the five seats we did get. And I have a feeling the woman wanted to rescind that offer as soon as we made it back to my mom.

Honestly it’s easier to lose your temper and cuss somebody out when you’re mad. But that doesn’t make it the right thing to do.

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 3rd, 2007 at 11:31 pm and is filed under A [cleft] lip divided. Comments are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.