I admit, I do rail often against hypocrisy, the mentality especially prevalent on the political left of holding the opposition to high standards while relaxing those standards when the same actions are committed by your group.
But, I don’t just talk the talk, I walk the walk. I expect no special treatment, only what is due in the circumstance. Far be it from me to think the world revolves around my ample frame.
Example: Just before lunch time today, I went to the Westwood branch of my bank, one whose name has changed maybe four or five times since it was Johnstown Bank and Trust, each time the service getting worse.
I make such stops every other week to get cash because, well, I’m a cash guy. When I worked for what has become the Johnstown Woke Gazette, I was the very last person to pay his union dues in cash instead of having it withheld from my paycheck.
I wanted it to hurt, seeing how much money my union was taking from me. Think of the line about gambling, which goes something like this: The guy who invented poker was bright, but the guy who invented the poker chip was a genius.
Casinos count on you forgetting those chips you are losing represent real money. It works out great, for the casinos.
Back to my banking habits, I get cash and use the old envelope system for my budgeting. I’ve done this even after retiring. Those withdrawals every other week are treated like a paycheck. Yes, I do charge things on a credit card, but I never carry a balance.
Today, I will pick up my 2004 Mustang, after it had some work done on it. I have the check already written.
Ahead of that, I was at the bank. A woman already at the counter when I walked in had some problem with a card, perhaps a debit card issued by the bank, and the lone beleaguered teller was trying to handle her, making a call to someone for assistance, trying to deal with the drive-through window, and looking nervously at me and the guy just ahead of me in the line.
I was there nearly 14 minutes, just waiting. I know, because I initiated the stopwatch function on my cell, even managed to play a game of chess online while I stood there.
The fellow ahead of me, a person I would later discover apparently was trying to make a deposit and check on the financial status of his business, out of the blue looked at me and offered me the chance to go ahead of him.
Perhaps he anticipated he would take some time, too, and wanted to cut me some slack. But, and here is where we get back to hypocrisy – or lack thereof, I believe in taking my turn, even as many others do not. This man got there ahead of me – I’m not sure how much ahead of me – and deserved to be waited on first. It would have been ridiculous, and hypocritical, to consider my time more important than his.
I politely told him thanks, but no need to give me his place.
About this time, the teller sent the woman being waited upon off with a promise to straighten out everything and get back to her down the line, just do not use the card. The teller also sent a tube out the drive-through apparatus to the person waiting there and then called over the man ahead of me.
It was then that the closed door to the office manager’s office opened, and out came a second teller. I’m sure she and the boss had been discussing company business.
Because I’ve seen tellers emerge just like that, then run off to lunch, I stood in my place. But, the teller went to her window, fired up her computer terminal, and beckoned me to come over.
My cashing of the check, and request for empty coin tubes for the wife took maybe three minutes and I was off to my Jeep. The man who had been ahead of me was in the midst of getting his situation resolved.
I’m not applying for sainthood regarding this experience, but I am noting that the world would be a much better place if people practiced the Golden Rule, do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
This is not to be confused with the alternative Golden Rule: He who has the gold, makes the rules.
That’s a topic for another day.
Sam Ross Jr's site 