The Lost Art of Listening

The Lost Art of Listening

It was a horror show.

Like a nightmare, only I wasn't dreaming. I was totally awake during the whole thing, but I truly wished it was only a dream. And all I wanted that morning was a breakfast sandwich.

So, once more I go into the eye of the storm, the belly of the beast, the heart of darkness in the center of Marion: That fast-food chain-disaster just off the interstate where the golden arches draw suckers to it like a manure pile draws flies.

Because I wanted to? Don't make me laugh.

I drove there once more because there are no places that offer breakfast anywhere during the twilight of daybreak, except the gas stations where you can grab a sandwich, if you want to call it that.

Because you'll have it their way, or the highway!

There's just so many times I can take a dry-as-dust sausage biscuit and pretend that it is something other than what it is: The same ol' same ol'.

And I was yearning for something different.

So, I prepare myself for battle and pull up to the speaker at the place and hear, “Can I help you?”

Carefully…oh, so carefully, I slowly enunciate the following: “I would like the #1 breakfast menu.” (Then I add)”The Egg McMuffin Meal.” (Just in case it leaves any doubt in the mind of the server on the other end.) The reason I add the part about the specific type of muffin, is because it does not really matter how many times I order it, how slowly the words come out of my mouth, or how loudly I verbalize my order, invariably I wind up with a sausage biscuit.

And to recap here for the reader, I don't want a sausage biscuit.

So the server says, “What kind of drink do you want?”

“Coffee,” I answer, “…with cream and sweetener.”

I cross my fingers, count to ten and pray softly to myself – a solemn prayer to My Maker, that if they get my order correct… just this once, I will dedicate myself to doing good all the rest of my life.

My answer is not long in coming.

“Now, what was that meal?”

“Number 1 – the Egg McMuffin.”

“And your drink?”

I stifle my urge to reach out and choke the speaker phone.

“I said already… coffee.”

“And what would you like in it?”

“I said already… cream and sweetener!”

“So, you would like a sausage muffin?”

I snap.

“No, I would like to leave. So I am… RIGHT NOW!”

And hit the gas, onto the street and go to the also-ran of the fast-food industry, the worm-hole of customer satisfaction on the other side of the interstate, where the mascot of the joint-that smiling King of Creepiness reigns supreme… just under the overpass and a few feet ahead of me.

I park the car in the lot.

No room for error now. No window, I want to see my foe face-to-face and take the battle directly to them.

“Offense… offense,” I'm thinking, like I'm preparing to sack the other team's quarterback all by myself.

But, once inside, I know the deck is stacked against me.

But, I go inside the place anyway, take a deep breath and say: “I was just down the street and I wanted an Egg McMuffin. I would like a breakfast sandwich like that… I don't care what you call it.”

A few minutes later, I am handed a bundle wrapped in yellow packaging, and I am nearly delusional with happiness.

I slap my money down on the counter, run outside, get in my car and storm out of the lot, as I am now very late for work. I open the wrapping as I drive and take a bite.

Only, my prize tastes funny.

I open the bun and inside is a folded egg.

That's it… Egg.

I mean, you would think that hiring the stone-deaf would hinder the level of service at the delivery window or inside these places, wouldn't you?

Maybe they should rethink that?

For most, they say, listening is a lost art.

But at these places, they have NOT got listening down to a science.

Like, if I wanted a cold glass of water, they would heat it up.

If I wanted it hot, it would come frozen on a stick, like a popsicle.

And what is this THING ABOUT MAYONNAISE?

I thought to take picture of a jar of the stuff, go to the order counter, point to the picture of the mayonnaise jar and shake my head and scream, as I point to my visual aid, “NO, NO, NO!” I've entertained the idea of hiring an interpreter someone who possibly might speak fast-food lingo and get through somehow to the staff.

I've thought of bribing them… offering them a 10percent tip if they left off the white stuff from my sandwich.

All to no avail!

Mayonnaise… it's like an episode of The Twilight Zone, only I'm in a time loop that I cannot escape, or sort of like the movie 'Groundhog Day,' and I'm Bill Murray, only going through the same situation day after day and desperately trying to see a different result: One where my sandwich is not slathered, soaked, smeared and running down to my elbows with mayonnaise.

Hope springs eternal, they say.

Time and time again, I have asked in many different ways; Like I would say, “Everything except mayo.”

Or, “Hold the mayo.”

Or, “No mayo please.”

Or, “I hate mayo, so none please?”

Or, “I'll kill myself if I see mayonnaise!”

Really? What does it take to get a sandwich without mayo?

An act of Congress? A Constitutional amendment? A Supreme Court decision in my favor?

I realize I'm Don Quixote, tilting at windmills in all this.

But, I'm still clinging to hope.

Only, the mayonnaise on that hope is making my grasp slip.

By Robert L. Hall