Questions, Q-tips and Turkey Basters

“How are you?”

To the untrained, innocent, naive, young and daring this can seem like a friendly question. How can three words be so life altering? It’s not like they’re those three words that you really don’t want that girl whose name is right on the tip of your tongue lying in bed next to you to say.

No, these are completely different words.

You have worked at CVS for upwards of 4 years now, and while you’d really like to have absolutely no communication with the man purchasing hemorrhoid cream and dolphin condoms, you instead proceed to ask the ill-fated and open-ended question of, “How are you?” His reply is “not good.” Not only does all the blood leave your face, but your memory does an instant replay of the last time you asked someone how they were doing, eliciting the same response, which subsequently led into a conversation about an unfortunate situation the customer found himself in involving horny goat weed and a turkey baster. Blood slowly starts to reenter your heart when the current customer rants about the bird that pooped on his car, and with an, “oh, that’s all,” response that defibrillates your heart you can begin to inhale again. Why it’s necessary to tell me about bird crap or horny goat weed or turkey basters is beyond me, because to be blatantly honest, there is no tooth fairy, you’re adopted and I’m only asking you “how are you” to pretend like I’m a freaking pleasant individual.

I don’t care about your niece or her dance recital, and yes it’s unfortunate that your father is getting an eyelash transplant tomorrow, but the second you walk out that door I’m going to forget what you just said, so why waste your breath?

What I hate more than the answer to the “How are you?” question is the non-response. We’ve all been there- it’s the “How are you?” that earns you a nod and makes you feel like a socially awkward teenager with baby fat and braces all over again. Because really?! I was just trying to be nice because I’m the new intern here and we work in the same office and it’s a completely open elevator so why wouldn’t I say “Hi, how are you?” Are you too important to utter a “good?”

In other news, while reading the shampoo bottle today (Why was I reading the shampoo bottle today? Because my dad feels it necessary to wake me up to remove the “female articles” from underneath the sink, so that he can fix the leak. So I take my dear sweet time in doing such, which leads to me reading shampoo bottle instructions because really dad? THEY’RE THE SAME AS Q-TIPS and I don’t see you turning that shade of green when you have to pick those up from the grocery store.)  I was reading this one bottle and it said to apply shampoo to wet hair and then rinse thoroughly. But for color and perm treated hair that you needed to thoroughly rinse the shampoo from your hair. Seriously? Do you really need to differentiate? I don’t know why that made me so perturbed, but it did, even though it seems somewhat anticlimactic now that I wasted an entire paragraph devoted to the fact that the one male vs five females living in my house has a fear of all things female.

And just a heads up. If a 7 year old boy is writhing around on the floor and laughing to himself, the appropriate question to ask is not “do you have ants in your pants,” becuase just like you opened your mouth filled with half eaten spinach at age 7 when your mom asked you if you were eating your vegetables, he will be sure to pull down his pants and superman whitey-tighties to show you that he does not in fact have ants in his pants. And in case you don’t learn your lesson the first time, do not repeat the aforementioned gesture with 3 1/2 year olds either. And when the 7 year old boy repeats said action on various dates without being provoked by all questions including ants and pants, and flashes you every tuesday and thursday that you babysit for him, and you explain the situtation’s uncomfortableness to the boy’s parents their response is “oh yea he does that sometimes,” run. Run very very far.

~ by jmswift on May 18, 2009.