All the Rage Wednesday: People Who Don’t Say Thank You

I’d like to start this post with a caveat: there are tons of different people who don’t say thank you (and I’ve already assigned various levels of hell to them all), but this All the Rage Wednesday is dedicated to those who don’t say thank you when you hold the door open. It’s such an arrogant quality that it merits a Rage Wednesday all its own.

I avoid doing any non-internet shopping around Christmas because I know that in a half hour among the crowds, I’ll get whipped up into a frothing rage and denounce my life in society in favor of a simpler life of foraging in the woods. However, once I made the mistake of going to the mall in December and my rage was frothed and whipped and covered in chocolate syrup before I even got through the doors.

Here I was, naively expecting to find some great gift for a friend that would redeem this whole Christmas shopping experience, ready to brace myself for the blindly shoving crowds and the large groups who walk slowly and the tourists who dart out of everywhere and don’t know where to stop.  I open the door to the mall, ready to regret everything, when out wafts a young pair–a man and a woman both in their early 20s–who are so enthralled by themselves that they don’t realize there’s a whole living, breathing person making it possible for them to exit the building.

They completely ignore me, who had opened the door not for them but for myself, and don’t so much as grunt in appreciation. Once they pass the Gratitude Point of No Return (the last point at which it’s socially expected to say thanks), I realize they’re going to go on living their lives in blissful ignorance of their rudeness.

Presumably, theirs is an existence unhindered by obstacles. Doors mysteriously open. Food is magically delivered to their tables. Their clothes appear washed and folded every few weeks. And House Elves keep everything tidy and clean.

Well, the House Elves may be ok with that sort of arrangement, but anyone who knows me knows I like a fine side of justice with my breakfast bacon, so I can’t let this kind of rude behavior go unpunished. Before the man had fully cleared the door, I stepped in front of him with the rage of 10,000 misunderstood teenagers and shoved him with my shoulder like the angry Russian woman fighting for her place in the bread line that I am deep down (it’s in my blood).

My shoulder came as quite the shock and he spun around confused and angry, just in time to see me walking through the door I had opened for myself like a big girl.

Am I proud of my behavior?

Absolutely. Just because someone didn’t spank him as a child, doesn’t mean he gets a free pass to live life as an asshole. And if no one else is going to point it out, I will.

On that note, a poem.

You walk nonchalantly past me at the door,
Without looking or nodding or anything more,
Thinking this must be my noble profession,
That tending to you is my very obsession.

Thinking the act is its own best reward,
You reason my presence is best left ignored.
You act like you’re doing me one solid favor,
Parading through like my fucking savior.

But the belt in my fist would object most sincerely,
As I whip at your rear somewhat severely,
Years of no discipline I’m fixing today,
By running after you and yelling, “WHAT DO WE SAY?”

 

Be my rage muse! Tell me what angers you and if it angers me too, I’ll write a terribly angry poem about it. Let me know in the comments!

-Tatiana