海角大神

Most of the stores I shop at are clearing out more and more space for self-service checkout. I鈥檝e never used it. As a card-carrying union member of the working class, I have solid and articulate objections to the concept, if anyone wants to hear them, but mostly I am fulfilling my obligation as an older citizen to be an old grump.

I don鈥檛 like self-service. It sounds dirty. Plus, I鈥檓 no good at it. I learned that years ago, the first time I encountered an unstaffed pay station in a parking lot. Against all odds, I managed to navigate the buttons and introduced my credit card to the machine. I even got the card back out again. I looked around for a ticket to come chunking out of the box, but there wasn鈥檛 anything to display on my car. So I wandered off the lot secure in the belief that some collaboration had occurred between my card, the machine, and a global positioning satellite, and it had sent a halo of paidness over my car. (When you don鈥檛 know how things work, it seems possible.)

It hadn鈥檛. A whisper of a receipt had wafted into a slot at the bottom of the machine, intended for my dashboard, and perhaps the next person had gotten it, or not, but my windshield was wearing a $40 ticket when I came back.聽

I sent a note to the authorities explaining that I had indeed paid, and was merely a muttonhead, but I used good syntax and spelled everything correctly, and they were not moved. If I鈥檇 gone in person, my shortcomings would have been more evident. I would have had my ticket waived in five minutes, plus maybe a little something extra to tide me over until my caregiver arrived.

I guess if I knew how anything works I might learn to be a little snappier about these things.聽

We have light-rail in our town now, and I haven鈥檛 used it much because I鈥檝e got feet, and time. But I did try to buy a ticket once or twice. They鈥檝e got machines right on the platform. Two or three trains will go by while I鈥檓 prodding the pay box for soft spots. First, of course, I look for the place to put in my coins. It鈥檚 not obvious. But it鈥檚 there. They鈥檇 really prefer you use something else. And it turns out two quarters doesn鈥檛 get you anywhere anymore.

I find another portal to the ticket world and start hammering away at buttons, but that鈥檚 rarely successful either. I always think the machine has just quit on me, but it turns out that it鈥檚 waiting for me to tell it 鈥淥K鈥� before it will go on. Everything鈥檚 got self-esteem issues these days.

鈥淥K,鈥� I press hopefully. Still no ticket. Then I remember that most people on the train have their tickets jammed right into their phones somehow. I don鈥檛 know how they get in there, but I take out my phone and pass it over the machine, up, down, along the sides and underneath, hoping something will go 鈥渂lip.鈥� Instead a paper towel shoots out the bottom, and apparently I鈥檝e also ordered the third season of 鈥淗ouse of Cards.鈥澛�

And this, I think darkly, is a machine in my native language in my hometown.

Well, crumb. They say older people are set in their ways, which is a kinder way to say we鈥檙e cranky. But it is true that not everything new is an improvement. We鈥檝e got the perspective to know what鈥檚 been lost when we鈥檙e riveted to our phones, oblivious to the birds and blossoms and breezes that are our true wealth and heritance. The nods to strangers, the smiles, all the little tugs on the gathering thread of our humanity 鈥� nice weather, cool T-shirt, who鈥檚 a good boy? 鈥� too often, they鈥檙e missing too. We鈥檝e ditched the present to be somewhere else, sometime else, with someone else.

OK, boomer. But if I were to be honest, a lot of my own crankiness is rooted in feeling stupid.

That鈥檚 really at the heart of it when I scowl at the self-service lines and rail against taking jobs from working people and farming out labor to myself, unpaid.

But still I will not do the self-service line at the grocery store. I will not. I鈥檇 probably scan my vegetables too hard and get premature salsa. No, sir: I want human hands on my fruit. Someone whose shirt I鈥檓 on a first-name basis with.