People Disclose The Most Patronizing Assumption They Received From Someone
27. Not Just a Lowly Exterminator
“When I was in my 20’s, I worked for a small pest control company. It was a family-owned business comprised of the owner (an NYC fireman and mentor to me) and his brother-in-law. We were very close and it was my first full-time job.
We worked long hours with no breaks and took pride in our work. It wasn’t glamorous, but it was something built together. It fed our families and represented us as contributing members of society.
Due to our hard work and emphasis on customer service, we became extremely busy.
Soon, we acquired multiple corporate accounts that subsidized our residential accounts.
One such account was an auto parts manufacturing company. We serviced their offices, machine shops, and warehouses. The building location and imports that came in offered us no shortage of issues, but we always managed to handle them promptly and on our first visit.
Eventually, the executives began asking me to service their homes after they noticed how well we managed their business.
I always went above and beyond for my customers, and these folks were no exception.
One day, while I was spraying the main office building, I walked into the VP’s office, after hours, to do their regular maintenance service. To my surprise, the VP and the CFO were sitting at a desk and having a conversation.
I knew them both well at this point as I had been servicing their homes for some time.
I stopped when I saw them and said, “Hey, what’s going on guys? Working late tonight? You want me to come back and hit the office last?”
“Nah, it’s cool man.
We’re just talking about how slow business is.”
“Oh, really? That sucks man, I’m sorry to hear that” as I’m doing my work around the perimeter of the room.
“Yea, well it is what it is I guess,” the VP replied.
“Well look, you guys have a solid product.
I wouldn’t panic just yet. I’m sure things will turn around,” I said as I finished up the office. “Alright guys, you’re all set. Have a good night.”
As I turned the corner, the VP said to his CFO in the nastiest and most sarcastic tone imaginable, “You know things are bad when the EXTERMINATOR is giving you advice!”
They had a big laugh over that one.
I paused, thought about what a tactful response would be, but decided it was better to walk away. It didn’t make sense to risk a big account over something like that, I thought. But then, as I was walking away, I heard him expound on his comment.
“Bro, if I ever get to the point where I gotta work as a freaking EXTERMINATOR, freaking kill me.”
That was enough for me.
I poked my head into his office, and in the same passive-aggressive sarcastic tone he used, I smiled and said, “Yeah, well, not all of our daddies give us companies.
Tee-hee.”
The words slapped him clean across the face. The CFO fell silent, the grin departing his face as the awkwardness drove his gaze to the floor.
“Oh, uh, hey…” the VP stammered, “Uh… I was uh, we were, umm, we were just joking around.”
“Ohhhh, ok…” I nodded slowly, casting an incredulous glance between the two men.
And with that, I left.
Neither man said a word before I was out the door. Nobody brought it up again, and we remained in good standing with the company.
Listen, I don’t need to explain myself or defend how I made or make a living. I try to be humble with everything that I do.
But forgive me if I tell you why I took such umbrage with what he said.
I came from nothing. My mother was a horrible boozer who worked as a bartender, and this conflict of interest made it impossible for her to hold a job.
As such, we were constantly moving. I attended seven different elementary schools and two middle schools. By the time I was in 7th grade, I had taken on the role of raising my younger sister and shielding her from witnessing as many of the horrors as possible.
Often, I would “trick her” into going to play together in her room when I sensed trouble. Then I would tell her I had to go outside, and I’d tell her not to open the door or come out of her room for any reason until I said ok.
I would protect her from the boozers and addicts that used our apartments as a place to “party,” which frequently ended with myself in a physical altercation with these grown adults. And if I’m being honest, I took pleasure in knowing that these lowlifes would spend the rest of their days knowing a fifteen-year-old kid had handed them their butt (and sometimes teeth) because they disrespected his home.
I would tell my sister the noise was our wrestling. I doubt if she believed that, but she listened. I would stay up all night on nights like this, making sure no one, including my mother, upset her. In the morning my mother would usually be passed out oftentimes, undressed on the floor or couch.
So I would cover her up or drag her into the bedroom before my sister got up and then I would tell my sister she was just sleeping.
By the time I got my sister off to school, I was often too tired and angry to bother with school myself.
So I just didn’t go. To give you an idea, in 9th grade, I averaged 3 absences per week. The criminal part about this was that I was a very intelligent child, but I lived in a world where school, college degrees, and careers just didn’t exist.
I did just enough to get by and even that I only cared enough to do because I wanted to avoid prolonging the high school experience. I thought I needed to graduate high school in order to get a job that would pay me enough for a small one-bedroom apartment.
The prospect of a degree or a career were completely lost on me, let alone having a home or a family.
My friends at the time lived the same life as I did. In fact, our parents were drinking/dosing buddies. This shared experience gave us a bond unique to our friendship.
We were each other’s support system. Looking back, I think the only time we could let our guards down and be KIDS was when we were together. But being withdrawn from other cliques in our rough neighborhood made us targets for other kids, as well as some street gangs in our area.
So we did what we thought was the only way to protect ourselves. We formed our own gang. In all honesty, it was more of a fraternity. But in the eyes of the actual gangs, we were just a rival gang in their territories.
Anytime we went out, there was always the prospect of violence. We couldn’t go out alone, we had to go everywhere in pairs or groups. I thank God none of us got killed, and none of us ever killed anyone else.
This was about the time that a few of us started becoming entrenched in boxing and martial arts.
What we thought initially would only help us in the streets turned out to be the door to a completely new path. Through martial arts, we learned the value of hard work, self-respect, and empathy. I learned that I wasn’t the victim in these situations, but just a participant, because we ALL have contributing factors as to why we are who we are.
I learned to not harbor hatred and anger because it will bring nothing positive to your life.
One day, social workers from the school showed up at our apartment. It was a bright sunny afternoon and my mother was wasted. They asked if they could speak to my mother alone, and I obliged.
I left the apartment. I don’t recall where I went or what I did. In fact, I don’t recall much of anything in the weeks that followed either, for that matter. Nor do I know exactly what was said at that meeting between my mother and the social workers.
What I do remember is that soon after that meeting, my sister was sent to live four hours away in upstate NY, with her father, and I was sent to live with my father and his fiancee. Being separated from my sister and my support system of friends was devastating.
But I knew she was finally safe, and that was all that mattered.
Unfortunately, things didn’t get much better at home for me. My father, and my now-stepmother, were not prepared to have a sixteen-year-old kid dropped in their laps. My stepmother never asked for it, and she never signed on for it.
She imagined a nice quiet life with just her and my old man and then suddenly she had this man-child dumped on her. She wasn’t happy about it. And she let it be known. My first night there, I woke up during the night, thirsty, and tried to sneak into the kitchen to get a drink.
As I opened the refrigerator, she yelled from the next room, “What’re you eating now you fat so-and-so!?”
I didn’t know how to react to that. My first instinct was to fight, to raise heck and stick up for myself. But I remembered my lessons in empathy.
I reminded myself that I wasn’t the only one going through this transition. And I bit my tongue.
But this wasn’t a one-time occurrence. This type of treatment became the norm. A constant norm. After a few months, it became too much to bear, so I ran away.
I went from place to place sleeping on the floors of my friends’ bedrooms. Into my senior year, I was still sleeping on floors and was under pressure from my mother to just drop out of school and get a GED. After all, she said, that’s what SHE had done.
But I stuck it out, I graduated and I got a job.
Got my first place at 18. I spent two years bouncing around, looking for steady work.
I worked as a bouncer, did private security, built a bulkhead, did construction, tree removal, delivered auto parts… whatever I could find to earn a paycheck. Then one of my friends who I had lived with in high school asked me if I remembered the exterminator from the bagel store we worked at in school.
I said of course. He told me the exterminator was having a hard time finding a reliable person and suggested I give him a call. And so I did. I started working at the Pest Control company when I was only twenty-years-old. It was the greatest thing I’d ever done.
I got to see on a day-to-day basis how a real family interacts with each other, and in time I became PART of that family. My boss’s daughters became like nieces to me. My boss and his brother-in-law owned beautiful houses next door to one another but came and went as if they shared one home, which just so happened to have a driveway laid through the middle of it.
Half of the brother-in-law’s house was turned into a big beautiful apartment, which in NY could have gotten him around $2,000/month at that time. He rented it to me for $900. My boss put me through school to get licensed in multiple chemical application categories under the NYS DEC, as well as my license to be a home inspector.
Within two years, I was making considerably more money than what exterminators generally make.
The increased salary allowed me to rent a music studio with my best friend and business partner, Lou, and for us to buy all the equipment we needed to pursue our true passion, which was making music.
Through music, I got to tour cities around the east coast, as well as going as far north as Buffalo and even Canada! I never in a million years thought I would visit these places, let alone get paid to perform my own music there!
Once the band was up and running, my partner and I started a charity organization called The Music Speaks Foundation, where we organized concerts featuring local bands who would come together and help raise money for someone in need in their community.
The bands would get a cut of ticket sales, and the rest went to the cause. Most of what we did was geared towards children living with addiction and domestic violence, but we also worked with breast cancer fundraisers, women’s support organizations, and pediatric cancer fundraisers.
All of this was possible because of my job as a “lowly” exterminator.
I owed everything in my life, up to that point, to the job that those two fools were now laughing at.
Never besmirch a man because he’s making a living. Have some humility, and remember you don’t know how he got to where he is. No one job has more value than another, because at the end of the day, we’re all just squirrels trying to find a nut.”
26. Not Allowed To Be Here? Let Me Show You My Badge
“I was working for the government as a “soil tester.” (geotechnical engineer). Basically crawling around in the dirt retrieving soil and geological samples for a variety of different purposes.
I had been called out to a construction site of a newly developed shopping mall.
Some very serious issues had popped up in the few months the mall was opened, a big “stink” about dangerous levels of methane gas and the agency I was working for at the time was tasked with doing the research.
I was alone at the time, my coworkers had gone over to check on another site across the way.
It was a warm day and we’d been working for several hours. I was sweaty, my hair in a messy bun, wearing dirty coveralls over my dress clothes. I looked like a hard-working person, maybe a maintenance, construction, or landscaping worker. I was working intently, test tubes and equipment laid out neatly all around when I suddenly felt “eyes” looking at me.
I turned around and saw a group of silhouettes – 4 people – standing a few feet away.
I was about to ask them to leave when I heard a woman’s voice say in the most condescending tone, “Take a look at this person Peyton.
Take a good look, because this is what happens when you don’t stay in school.” They all kind of snickered when the woman spoke again, barking “Peyton?! Alexis?! Jackson?! Stand over here so I can take your photo. We’re posting this on the fridge to remind Peyton what her future looks like if she keeps screwing around with her education.” The kids (all older teenagers 17-19) mumbled and shuffled around but obeyed.
By this time I had stood up and was reaching inside of my coverall to retrieve my credentials. At the same time, I could see that my minions had returned from lunch and were heading towards us.
“Ma’am, I’m going to have to ask you to leave this area immediately; you are trespassing onto a secured area.
It’s not only illegal for you to be here, but it’s also unsafe.” She looked at me incredulously with the most punchable smug smirk, and flipped her expensive designer sunglasses back down over her eyes, and responded, “Um, excuse me? You obviously have no idea who I am? My husband OWNS this property, honey, and I’m certainly not going to take orders from someone whose job it is to scrounge around in the dirt.
What’s your name? You’re going to regret this little interaction when you’re sitting in the unemployment office.”
At this point, I flipped open my badge and shoved it towards her, so she could clearly read my credentials which included the word “Dr” along with some official government gibberish and symbols.
Her face comically went from confused to understanding to concern in 5 seconds.
I called out to my minions (aka – armed military security personnel) and said, “Gentlemen, if you wouldn’t mind, this woman is trespassing in a secured area and refusing to leave.
Could you please convince her and her family to comply with my lawful order to end her trespass and explain the consequences of not doing so?” “Absolutely Dr. Smith!” they responded, moving quickly towards the woman and the teens.
She began stammering that she “didn’t know” and to “call my husband; he’ll explain” and “you’re making a big deal out of a nothing” all the while they were guiding her by her elbows, steering her away from the area.
Her kids were telling her to calm down and stop this but she continued to argue, becoming belligerent and uncooperative, so local law enforcement was called to aid in arresting her. After some heated discussion, she finally handed the keys to her Escalade (of course it was) to one of the kids at which point she took a government taxi to discuss the matter further.
At that point, I decided to call it quits for the day and offered to go pick up some ice cream for the crew for a job well done.”
25. Don't Tell Her What To Do; She's Been A General Manager For Almost A Decade
“I was a Restaurant Manager for almost 20 years. The first nine years, I worked at a fast-casual concept in St. Louis, MO. There are a lot of affluent, low-crime suburbs around St. Louis. I didn’t work in many of those areas. For at least seven of those years, I worked in the low-income, high-crime areas in and around the city.
There are advantages and disadvantages to working in both environments.
Honestly, I would take a store in a low-income area over a store in an affluent area. In my experience, the quality of the candidate pool isn’t as good, but the quantity more than makes up for it.
I would much rather spend a little extra time interviewing candidates and being selective in my hiring than find myself with 4 positions to fill and 2 applications.
Employees respond to honesty, respect, consistency, and investment. What you put into them is what you get out most of the time.
This is consistent across age, race, gender, orientation, and socioeconomic status. I took my responsibility to invest in my employees and provide the tools, resources, and environment they needed to be successful very seriously. I was rewarded with dedicated, loyal, hard-working employees and generous bonus checks.
Even in locations deemed unprofitable lost causes.
Eventually, I took a GM position with another concept. My store was a new location they were building in East St. Louis. For the readers who are unfamiliar with the St. Louis area, the “East Side” is across the mighty Mississippi River, in Illinois.
It is home to casinos, clubs, after-hours venues, and a 1 in 83 chance to be the victim of a violent crime.
Tied with Chicago, East St. Louis is safer than 7% of all other US cities. You are twice as likely to be harassed and 17.4 times as likely to be murdered in East St.
Louis than the national average.
I’m a stubborn woman, the pay was very good, and the company I was leaving was failing. In an attempt to keep the concept viable long enough to sell, the owner made a lot of changes I wasn’t comfortable with.
I couldn’t work there and be a person I was proud of. I was determined to make this new situation work at least until I could find something else.
The company bought and renovated the location from a moderately successful restaurant. When they purchased the building, they offered a couple of the previous management team a position when the new concept opened.
Their logic was that the previous team knew the area and would be an asset in getting the new concept off the ground. I disagreed as soon as I met them, but no one asked me.
At some point during the first week of training employees, one of my assistant managers, a recruit from the previous restaurant, pulled me to the side for a chat.
At least 20 years my senior, he and I made up 66% of the white people on staff. He had yet to impress me. In our limited time together, he was mostly condescending, rude, and lazy. I hadn’t addressed it yet, it was on the list.
Since mostly all he did all day was walk from one area to another and lean against the wall it wasn’t at the top of my list. He wasn’t useful but he also wasn’t destructive, he just existed.
“Hey there little lady, how are ya?” He asked nonchalantly, leaning against the walk-in.
“My name is Melissa.
Please don’t call me pet names, it’s inappropriate and I really don’t appreciate it.” I paused to make eye contact before continuing. “Can we walk and talk? I have approximately one million things to do.” I chuckled distractedly and inched in the direction I was headed before he stopped me.
“Slow down for a minute.
You aren’t that busy.” He chuckled. I frowned. “I need to talk to you about something. It’s important.” He finished lazily, continuing to hold up the wall.
Realizing he wasn’t interested in my list ‘o things to do, I took a deep breath and focused my attention on him.
Outwardly calm and relaxed, inside I fought the impulse to be irritated at the most useless man who suddenly decided he was the most important thing I had going on. “Ok, what’s up?” I asked with a patient smile.
“Well, you’ve been here a couple of days now and I’ve been watching you.” He paused, offering me a coy smile.
“There are some things you need to know about working in this area with these people.” He said hooking his thumbs on his belt loops, a serious look overtaking his face. “Now, first of all…”
“I’m sorry, just a second, can you clarify who you mean by ‘these people’ please? Just so we are on the same page?” I asked sweetly, cocking my head to the side innocently, giving him an opportunity to save himself from this conversation.
“The minorities.” He clarified unapologetically and gestured in the direction of the kitchen before continuing.
“Now there are certain things you need to know about working with them. They ain’t the same as the folks you’re used to.” He explained seriously. “First off…”
“First off,” I interrupted him again, “I don’t know if you understand what the word minority means, but we, you and I, are the minority here.”
“Well now, you know what I mean.” He smiled conspiratorially, throwing in a wink and a head tilt for good measure.
“What you mean is black people and I’m going to stop you before you lose your job.” I held up my hand when he opened his mouth to protest.
“Look, you don’t know me. You don’t know that my husband is black and my daughter is bi-racial. You don’t know that I’ve worked with every shade of employee for nine years as a General Manager and that I would take 90% of these employees over you every single day of the week.” I paused, wrestling with my righteous anger, attempting to educate and not humiliate this victim of his own ignorance.
“Hold on…” He protested.
“No.” My tone was venomous.
“This moment, this singular moment is the only time your racist attitude will not cost you your job. I will assume that your ignorance isn’t malicious and educate you. All of our employees are to be treated with respect, given the training and tools to be successful, and judged by their actions and nothing else.
Do you understand my expectations?” I asked him.
“I didn’t say anything bad; I just wanted to make sure you understood what you were working with here. I’m helping you.” He sneered incredulously at me.
“Do. You. Understand. My. Expectations.” I repeated, maintaining eye contact.
“Sure.” He scoffed, dismissing me and turning to walk away.
“Come back here please.
I would like you to explain them to me. I want to be certain there are no misunderstandings.” I called after him. He stopped and turned around, the hate visible in his eyes.
“What?” He bit off the word.
“Explain to me what treating employees with respect, giving them the training and tools they need to be successful and judging them by their actions means.
Explain it to me, so that I am certain you understand and are no longer ignorant of the situation in my restaurant.” I said flatly.
He stared at me, gauging my seriousness, deciding what his pride and ego were worth.
I smiled, “That’s ok, not everyone has the same skills and experience.
We have identified the issue and that’s the first step.” I paused and looked at the clock. “You have four hours left in your shift. Grab a notepad and a pen and have a seat in the dining room. I need to finish up some things and I will meet you over there in a few hours.
I expect you to have 10 realistic ideas on how to demonstrate our respect and support to our employees. Feel free to use your phone or grab the laptop from the office if you need to. I can’t wait to see what you come up with.” I smiled again then turned and walked away, watching him seethe from the corner of my eye.
He made it a couple of months before he quit. Longer than I thought he would. He was not interested in being coached and developed. That worked out well for me as he was intentionally obtuse, unmotivated, and entitled. I did not enjoy developing him.”
Just by describing black people as "those people" I already know what kind of person he is, and I have no time for him or his opinions.
24. She Analyzed My Diet In Front Of The Class
She has a very good reason for her “poor” diet.”
“I had finally realized that I had to fix my own life and that it was up to me to figure out something I was good at, so I could support my two daughters and better our lives.
After a lot of thought, I decided to go to the nearby community college. I had always been good in school, and due to my income, tuition would be free. In fact, at the end of the semester, the government would even give me a check for over a thousand dollars if I passed all my classes.
I could then use this money to buy supplies and books, get to school, even buy an electronic typewriter second-hand, so I could type my papers.
The problem was, I only received the check at the end of my first semester.
Now the college had a program that loaned the textbooks to me and paid for my bus tickets that first semester, and my mom agreed to watch my younger girl while I was in class, so what could go wrong? I would go to college, become a teacher, and have a stable income and a good life for my girls.
All was well until I reported to Welfare that I was going to school and that I would receive a check in December for over a thousand dollars.
I was prepared to be told that I would receive no financial aid in January/February. I told them in August as I wanted time to plan if my aid would be cut.
I wasn’t prepared to be told my financial aid could not be touched but my food stamps were cut to zero, effectively immediately.
Oh, and there will be an immediate investigation for fraud as if I could go to school clearly someone lived with me.
The social worker then leaned over and quietly said, “Stay home. Your children are five and three. I understand one is in kindergarten, but the other one needs you.
I can’t have all my mothers going to school. Where will my job be if all of you go to work? If you quit, your check will come every month. You’ll have your food stamps. I even have a brochure for some free workshops you can do with your kids.
Deal?”
It was hard, but I told her no.
She kept her word. She sent an investigator and she eliminated my food stamps. I was bereft. I used the twenty that was leftover from my welfare grant after paying rent and utilities and I bought the basics.
At one store, the forklift had jabbed through four bags of potatoes.
The bags had been taped up and most of the potatoes remained. I bought about thirty pounds of potatoes for just over a dollar. I bought a couple of marked-down chickens and some bacon ends for meat. Oatmeal, carrots, onion, noodles, and rice.
It wasn’t enough, but I’d have to make it work.
As you can imagine by the end of the month we were scraping bottom. I had one chicken left to feed the kids for the week and ten pounds of potatoes. A few scraps of this and that.
I figured, “It’s ok. I’ll make regular dinners for the kids with the chicken, and they are little, so they won’t eat much, and I’ll just have potatoes.”
To my dismay, about the third day of my new diet, my health teacher announced, “Everyone is to keep a food log.
Write down everything you eat for the next three days, and then we will analyze your food intake in the next class.”
But I couldn’t lie.
I knew I should be eating differently, but I was doing what I had to do, and there was an honor in that.
I would not cheapen my honor with a lie.
So I wrote down what I ate, boiled potatoes and baked potatoes, fried potatoes (fried in bacon fat, yum – flavor!), a teaspoon of ketchup, a tablespoon of margarine.
I turned it in.
My teacher called me up to the front of the class when it was my turn to be analyzed.
“You appear to eat nothing but potatoes.
This is a very unhealthy diet…”
And he spent five minutes outlining all the key nutrients potatoes are lacking and why eventually I would become very ill with my limited diet choice.
Triumphantly he looked at me — confident he had gotten through. “So knowing this, what will you have tonight for dinner?”
“Potatoes.
Boiled. Plain.”
“But, but, why. . .?”
“My kids are having the last of the chicken soup. I don’t get any funds until the first of the month, in three more days. My kids will have enough good food if I only eat potatoes, so I’ll eat potatoes.”
I sat down.
And suddenly the teacher decided not to analyze anyone else’s diet in front of the class.”
23. He's Not A Minimum Wage Worker
“I still laugh about mine today. I was about 35-years-old and a mid-level manager at the largest telecommunication company in the United States. I flew into Kentucky to see a client to set up project management for his system. I walked into his office and met his secretary first.
Before I could say anything, she told me they were not hiring right now, and would not be hiring for a while.
I told her I was not there for a job —I needed to see her boss about something else. She said, ‘Oh, you’re the delivery guy, and you need to take the shipment to the dock on the backside of the building.’ I told her I was not the delivery guy.
I said, ‘I would just like to see your boss.’ Her last response was that I would have to make an appointment because her boss was waiting for someone important from Atlanta, Georgia.
So, I just stood there, while she stared at me, trying to figure out why I had not left.
Internally, I was laughing when I should have been mad.
Her boss comes from out back, and she says to him something similar to, ‘I don’t know what this guy wants.’
Her boss immediately comes over to me with a big smile, gives me a big huge handshake and a hug.
She looks bewildered.
As we go into the back, her boss says something to the effect of, ‘You and I need to have a conversation.’
As you probably have already figured out: I was black, and in her mind, she just could not visualize a black person in her presence as being someone of importance in an executive position.
The sickening look on her face after her boss said they were going to have a conversation. Priceless!”
22. He Understands Your Finance Package Very Well; He Has A Master's In Finance
“For background, I need to explain that my husband has a short temper and a lively wit so he often lashes out with the perfect comeback while I’m fumbling for a retort. (I’m the queen of coming up with a great response hours later.)
We had been married for a few years, and lived and worked in northern California.
We were still driving the beaters we had all through college so we decided it was time to buy a newer car. After poring over Consumer’s Digest for months, we knew just what we wanted and approximately what we should pay.
At the second dealership we visited, we found the right car.
It was a floor model of the previous year, so we knew we could get a decent discount on a brand new car. We happily settled down with a salesman, thinking we would sign a few forms and drive away in a few minutes.
The salesman had other ideas.
He didn’t want to discount the car because it had many premium options. We got into the little game where he would stand up and “go check with his manager” to see if he could possibly give us the discount we thought was fair.
We didn’t know at the time that this is (was?) standard procedure. We were feeling uncomfortable and irritated by the time we got him to talk down to what we knew was a reasonable purchase price.
But! Then we had to go through the laundry list of extras they wanted to sell us: special coating to reduce paint chips and rusting (rusting in California?!), special coating to make that new car shine last longer, special treatment of the upholstery so it wouldn’t get stained, and so forth.
We tried to cut to the chase more than once, saying we didn’t want any extras, but it was like he had to recite every detail before letting us escape.
And then, the financing. We quickly told him we had the down payment ready and our credit union (we both worked at Chevron) had pre-approved our loan.
But, the car company was offering special financing for a limited time only and this guy really, really wanted us to take it. The discussion got a little heated as he kept explaining the same details over and over, and my husband kept pointing out that the credit union was a better deal.
I don’t know what kind of sales tactic this was, but at last, the salesman sighed and, gesturing to his calculator and the page of figures, said, “I guess you just can’t understand the advantages of our finance package because all these calculations are outside your expertise.”
My husband stood slowly.
“I have a master’s degree in finance. I design and code financial programs for a living. We work right across the freeway there, where we have a million-dollar computer that runs our company’s billion-dollar businesses around the world. If you think I’m having trouble following your high school calculations on your ninety-nine cent calculator, then I guess we’ll have to buy from the next dealer down the road.”
I swear the guy blanched.
I stood and was following my husband out the door when he came after us, stammering his apologies and begging us to come back. We had spent most of the day with him — and all his hard work was going down the drain.
He practically abased himself to get us to come back to the table, and my husband made him take a thousand dollars off the price before we’d sit back down. (I noticed he didn’t have to check that with his manager.) We signed a few papers and walked out with the keys to our new car.”
21. Maybe I Should Get A Job? Um, Yeah, I Have One
Think before you say.
“‘Maybe you should get a job.’
By one of the nurses at my dad’s care home.
I’d just finished my studies and had decided to take some time out before getting a job because it was clear that my dad’s early-onset dementia was getting very bad, very quickly.
So I moved home for 6 months to help my parents. The timing worked out well because a month after I moved home, my dad had a psychotic break and needed to move into a care home. My mom was too overwhelmed to be able to cope with everything, so the fact I was there and not working meant I was able to sort everything out.
For the few months between Dad going into care and me starting my first job, I visited him every day. One of the senior nurses at the home was a sour-faced, Irish woman who used to make comments to her colleagues (that I was clearly meant to overhear) about young people being too lazy to work and living off benefits.
I never said anything, I was always polite to her and just acted as if I hadn’t heard her. She just became more blatant with her comments as she clearly thought I was too stupid to realize that they were directed at me, so she just made it more and more obvious.
I continued to ignore it. I didn’t want to anger her by setting her straight in case she took it out on my dad somehow.
The week before I was about to start my new job, I went into the home for a meeting about my dad’s care plan.
Annoyingly, it was Sour Face who was the nurse attending. While talking to the social worker (who was lovely), she overheard me saying that I’d been a bit bored lately (the context being that I was looking forward to starting work).
That’s when Sour Face told me to get a job.
I don’t usually show off or act like a jerk about the fact I have a Ph.D. in genetics from Cambridge University, but on this occasion, it seemed like the right thing to do.
I took great enjoyment in telling her that I was starting a new job the following week researching genetic causes of childhood cancers and that it was a nice follow on from my Ph.D.
thesis in developmental genetics. I ended my little speech with, ‘Oh, and I’ve never claimed benefits in my entire life.’ Her face was an absolute picture.
Fortunately, my dad was moved to a better home with nicer staff soon after that, and I put in a written complaint about her.”
20. He Can Afford More Than An Old Truck, You Know
“Last month I went to a local Ford dealership to buy a new F-150 for our truck fleet.
I am the majority shareholder in a real estate investment and development firm with a valuation nearing $100M, and I take a very active hand in day-to-day operations.
I had just gotten to the dealership, still in work clothes.
It had been a day of drywall finishing and HVAC installation in a large convenience store we were rehabbing, and I looked a bit like I had been rolled in flour. I had called my wife and asked her to meet me at the dealership to look at the new trucks we had picked out on their online inventory.
Nothing spectacular, but lower-end, current-year model work trucks in the $25K range.
I begin walking around, and a salesman immediately comes out to meet me. You know, the race to you before another salesperson gets to you semi-walk, semi-trot. I guess I wasn’t too aware that I looked like crap rolled in flour, and I could tell as he neared me and slowed down, he had already assessed my net worth at around $50.00.
He handed me his card and shook my hand like he was pulling something out of the trash.
I introduced myself and told him I was looking for a new work truck. He apparently didn’t see that I had driven into the lot in a somewhat dirty, but still new-looking, 2016 model.
For some reason, as we chatted and he asked what I needed, he steered me to their POS line.
You know the one, all of the old trucks that were a day away from going to the wholesale auction. I looked at them for a few seconds, and then told him I was wanting something a bit higher up the ladder — something new.
He responded by saying that they didn’t have anything less than $25K on the lot that was new, but they had this great 2004 with only 190K on the odometer for only $7,995 with easy financing.
I suppose I had yet to understand that he believed I was not a customer for a new truck, and he kept pushing me at the wonderful, worn-out bargains.
Around the same time that I told him again that I wanted a new truck, and reached for my wallet to hand him one of my business cards, my wife pulled onto the lot and headed right toward us.
She drives a black 2018 Mercedes S Class.
The salesman was still talking to me about 10-year-old trucks as she stopped and climbed out of the car. She took one look at me and laughed because of the way I looked. The salesman, on the other hand, kept looking back and forth between us, and at that moment, he may have deduced that he was missing something critical.
I looked at my wife as I handed him my card and said that I was having a little trouble getting to see the three trucks we had picked out.
Suddenly, in the salesman’s mind, the red lights began to go off. He looked at my business card, blinked a few times, and wordlessly pointed to his right at the new work trucks.
He then quietly suggested we go look at them. Before we started to walk, my wife began to brush and slap the remaining drywall dust off of my back and shoulders, and commented how I looked like a ghost.
We looked at the trucks and picked one out.
No test drive, no real discussion, just a nice white 2018 Ford F-150 with no whistles or bells to add to the seven trucks we already have. We finished the paperwork in just a half hour, wrote a check for significantly less than the sticker price, made arrangements to pick up the truck the next morning, and then got ready to leave.
The salesman was standing quietly by the door to the sales manager’s office as I walked out.
I shook his hand again and said, “One word of advice: never take anything at face value. It might cost you.”
He got his commission, we got our new truck, and later that week, he sent us a nice thank-you note.
The day ended well.”
19. His Car Doesn't Reflect His Bank Account Balance
“I’m pretty well off in life.
I have a higher-end 6 figure salary at 24 years old.
I have a full beard and wear blue jeans and T-shirts (Like the ones with funny obscene phrases on them) and beat up old boots because I’m frugal.
I have multiple vehicles, two muscle cars and a 1996 Jeep Cherokee.
I usually drive the Jeep because it’s my beater car, it never requires more than an oil change and it’s trustworthy in all seasons.
The other cars are for nice days or when I’m lazy and don’t fill up the Jeep. I don’t flaunt my money because all of our graves are the same size, be humble.
I met a girl at a friend’s bonfire and we immediately hit it off. We were talking for a few days and finally decided to go out. I decided to take the Jeep because it was the last thing parked in the driveway.
I picked her up and we went to dinner at Texas Roadhouse, like a gentleman I paid, no questions asked.
We then decided to head to the bar to grab a few drinks, but I had to stop at the ATM and grab funds out because I limit myself.
I grabbed the funds, put the receipt in my pocket, and carried on.
The night went on, we left the bar, dropped her off (yes, I was sober), and continued to talk for the following 2 weeks.
After that it was short answers, canceling plans, etc.
Found out from a friend that she started seeing some other guy, and her reason for not seeing me was, ‘he drives a Jeep Cherokee, let’s be serious, Guy A has a 2012 F150!’
Apparently, I had accidentally put the receipt with my phone in her purse, and eventually, she found it months later, the conversation went something like this:
Her: ‘Hey, sorry I’ve been busy with work and whatnot.’
Me: ‘Guess you were too busy with Guy A to be bothered with answering back.’
Her: ‘Yeah, I wasn’t thinking straight.
I have a question!’
Me: ‘What’s the question?’
Her: ‘If you make a ton of money, why do you drive a POS Jeep?’
Me: ‘How do you know how much I make?’
Her: ‘Well, I found the ATM receipt in my purse from the night we went out.’
That was the end of the conversation once she found greener grass, but that greener grass appeared to be spray painted.”
18. Spoiled? This "Spoiled Kid" Has Gone Through More Than You Know
“Once, an old lady on the bus approached me.
Long story short, she addressed how spoiled we kids are nowadays (I was 18 at the time, but I guess she assumed I was 14–15 since I look very young) and we have no idea what hard work, struggling and poverty means anymore.
She saw me playing on my phone, having 3 shopping bags with me, wearing expensive clothing, etc. According to the way she was talking, she must have thought I was a 14–15-year-old pretentious boy who got money from his rich parents to go out shopping, buy and do whatever he wants.
Being naive and knowing nothing about the dark side of the world while living in endless undeserved, underappreciated comfort.
I didn’t respond much since I had to go off the bus to the next station and I was feeling too uncomfortable about the situation anyway.
So again, according to this woman, I look like a 14–15-year-old spoiled, rich, pretentious boy who knows nothing about the world and never had to struggle a bit or work hard to accomplish anything.
In reality, I’m a 19-year-old domestic violence survivor. I struggled with PTSD, severe social anxiety, a major stuttering problem, and depression for years.
I was bullied and tortured at school, lost my best friend when I was 14 and it was even me who discovered his body.
I wore the old, broken clothing from my brother since we were so poor we had to choose between food and clothing.
Most of the funds were spent on my father’s addiction anyway. I almost got kicked out of school and got into serious problems with the law when I was just 15.
Luckily, I managed to get back on track. I started an apprenticeship (work system here in Austria is different than in the US) and worked very hard to get my life back, get over my PTSD, especially social anxiety and depression.
I finished my education and got a good success award which I was so proud of.
I have a good profession and a well-paid job now and bought myself a car, live in my own apartment, have many good friends and a great relationship.
I had to work my butt off for this life and had to grow up at a young age.
I just don’t look like it. You should never judge a book by its cover. And even though this old lady didn’t mean to be rude, it still highly offended me. I regret staying silent and not defending myself in front of her because this could have been a life lesson for her.”
I am glad you overcame all of that. I am still working on it.
17. Assume I'm Not A Good Crafter? Think Again
“I was in a craft store and looking at different items for the crafts I do. This little old lady walked over and started telling me that the items in my cart were wrong for a beginner to buy and lecturing me about how if it’s my first time, I really should get ‘x, y, z’ products, and so she starts removing items from my cart and replacing them with what she feels I should be purchasing, setting my old items onto a nearby shelf.
She then stands there for another 10 minutes, instructing me on how the proper technique works and that if I need any help I should give her a call and gives me her phone number.
Then she walks off. I was too stunned. She didn’t even really let me talk.
I put my own items back into the cart, put the ones she placed in there back on the shelf, paid for my stuff and left.
In the parking lot, she happened to see me loading my few bags into my roommate’s car and saw I had put her items back, and she ticked her tongue at me and shook her head.
‘Well, now you shouldn’t call me at all because you can’t even follow simple directions.’
Don’t worry, lady. I taught myself to crochet, knit and cross-stitch, I’m legally blind, autistic, have multiple learning disabilities and autoimmune disorders that cause various muscular issues. You probably could not teach me anything I haven’t had to find a unique workaround to do it my own way despite my various challenges, but have a nice day.”
Another User Comments:
“Who the heck just takes stuff out of someone’s cart? That takes nerve.” Reddit user
Reply:
“A lot of people just assume that if they see someone who clearly looks disabled, that they can treat us like children, but even then, you wouldn’t take things away from a strange child, but nah, they lack serious boundaries I suppose.
I do not really like to brag, but in a way, I am proud for overcoming my challenges and not letting them stop me.” Reddit user
Very rude of that lady.
16. Yes, Even A Woman Can Understand Cars
“This was about 20 years ago, and it involved a friend.
I had a slow leak in my car tire and took my car to a local car maintenance chain store to have it repaired. They quoted me $20 for the repair and I gave the go ahead.
While I was waiting for the repair, a technician came out and told me that my cabin air filter was dirty and needed to be changed. He showed me what I assumed to be my dirty air filter.
I took my car in for regular maintenance and just had the filter changed a few months before.
I wasn’t car savvy so I didn’t know for sure how long the car cabin air filter should last.
I thought a few months was a bit short for the lifespan, but the filter the technician was showing me was very dirty. I thought maybe I just lived in an extra polluted area, so I agreed to have the air filter replaced for the cost of $50.
A few months later, a friend whom I worked with had a slow leak in her tire. Her husband used to be a mechanic and restored cars as a hobby and maintained her car for her. However, she wasn’t sure whether he had the materials or time for the repair.
She needed to drive to an offsite meeting the next day and wanted to get her tire fixed right away.
My tire repair went well and I didn’t have any issues with it afterward. I told her where I got mine repaired and said they did a good job.
I forget now why, but I accompanied my friend when she brought her car into the car maintenance shop at lunchtime. They quoted her the same amount — $20 for the repair, and she gave the go ahead.
While we were waiting for the repair, a technician came out to let her know that her cabin air filter was dirty and needed changing.
‘See all the dirt on this? You don’t want to be breathing that.’ The technician held out the air filter to show her how dirty it was.
It was dark as if it had been filtering smoke. I felt validated. My friend’s filter was as dirty as mine.
Perhaps we did live in a high pollution area after all and everyone’s filters just got dirty quickly.
My friend stood up and took the air filter from the technician and turned it over in her hands thoughtfully. She looked up and glared at him angrily.
‘My husband is a mechanic and he maintains my car. I know for a fact that he just changed my cabin air filter three weeks ago.’
My friend’s voice was loud and firm and even though she was barely over 5 feet tall, her demeanor was intimidating.
She now had the attention of everyone in the waiting room. ‘I will NOT be replacing my air filter today. I only need my tire repaired. And I expect when I leave, that my air filter will be as clean as when I brought my car in.’
The technician’s expression was priceless.
‘Yes, ma’am.’ He barely squeaked out his reply and quietly left, his face beet red with embarrassment. It turned out that the shop tried to hit every single customer up for a cabin air filter. It was a quick $50 and most people fell for it.
Although I realized that I’d been scammed, I left the shop happy.
My friend had put the technician in his place and ratted him out to all the other customers in the waiting room. And I would have gladly paid another $50 just to see that look on the guy’s face again.”
15. They Were Ready To Spend Big Bucks On A Kitchen, They Just Didn't Look Like It
“After my wife and I bought our first home, we needed to get a new kitchen. It took us a lot of time to go to all the kitchen stores, get prices, and we really wanted to put money into a kitchen with high quality, so money wasn’t an issue.
One of the stores we went into, was a new store that opened in our area.
It was a large home decoration place, offering everything from a bath to a door handle, including kitchens and even utensils. A kind of IKEA, but far more high-end with prices to match that image.
As we are looking around the kitchen display area, we found a kitchen we really liked.
Just the style we were aiming for. But the price wasn’t written on it, so I had to look for a salesperson. Living in a hot place, I was window shopping in shorts, a t-shirt and flip-flops, because who thought you had to show your riches to get proper service?!
Anyways, found a salesperson, and asked about the kitchen we were interested in, and its price.
His reaction?
‘That’s probably a kitchen you can’t afford.’
I stood there as my jaw dropped to the ground, and my wife trying to figure out what just happened. I looked at the salesperson and said, ‘I guess we won’t be buying our kitchen here, I’d rather pay someone else the 50K budget we have for a kitchen,’ and walked away.
This time, the salesman was the one with the jaw dropped, since a 50K kitchen is almost 3 times the average cost of a kitchen.
3 months later, that store went out of business. Apparently, sales weren’t going that well. Maybe because the people that worked there are arrogant? They very well deserved it for the way they treated customers.”
14. So Much More Than Just A Toilet Cleaner
“One summer, I was working in the housekeeping department at the hospital where I was cleaning hallways and patient rooms. The rooms were cleaned daily, so you tend to develop acquaintanceships with longer-term patients and their visiting loved ones.
One day, the friendliest, kindest mom and her visiting daughter were telling me goodbye as the mom was due to be released.
I was saying my goodbyes to them in return when they both started complimenting me profusely over how beautiful they thought I was. ‘Thank you very much,’ I replied. I thought it would end there, but they added how nice and kind I was as well.
‘I really appreciate that. And both of you are so sweet. It’s been a joy to see you every day,’ I replied.
As I was preparing to leave, the daughter said, ‘We’ve been thinking about it all week, and we just wanted to say we think you should be a model!’ ‘Wow,’ I said.
‘That’s very kind of you.’
The daughter went on … ‘It’s just you’re so beautiful and so sweet, and we think there must be something else you can do besides cleaning toilets for a living.’ So, I smiled, dropped my head, thanked them again and left the room as quickly as I could.
I didn’t mention to them that I was a full-time pre-law student pursuing a double-major in English Language & Literature and African & African American Studies at the University of Michigan. Or that my mother was an attorney who attended UofM as an undergrad & law school student.
I didn’t ‘explain’ that I was already doing ‘more than cleaning toilets’ because my sister had gotten me that job in her department where she, as beautiful as she was, fed her family cleaning those same toilets. She went on to supervisor, and to acquire a BA, and pursue a master’s in Organizational Management as well, but that was not the point either.
I worked alongside people there who would retire from that very position doing nothing more than ‘cleaning toilets,’ mopping floors, and dragging 75lb bags of patient laundry all in a concerted effort to prevent nosocomial infections in patients which otherwise account for a significant portion of illnesses that threaten patient health and lives.
What are nosocomial infections? They are the infections patients acquire WHILE they are in the hospital setting.
Housekeeping, later renamed ‘Environmental Engineering,’ to help highlight the ultimate purpose of the department, was charged with containing these infections by thorough cleaning and disinfecting of all things used by and touched by patients.
But hey, I was cute, and I had a scrub brush in my hand, so there must have been something better for me to do, right?
At what point in American history did an honest wage for an honest day’s work become not good enough? Not honorable enough.
My nephew and nieces’ medical needs were provided through the health insurance my sister earned by the work she performed in that job. My co-workers took care of their families. Some put themselves through school. We were all people performing an essential function.
I was grateful that day that I was the one they said that to if for no other reason than what an even bigger kick in the stomach it would have been if it had been my chosen profession that they were telling me wasn’t good enough for these well-meaning, presumptuous, condescending and insulting strangers.
And, that they felt it was so obviously not enough that they felt comfortable telling me so directly.
I never told my sister.”
13. Improve My Skills To Get A "Better Job?" You're Quite Mistaken
Do you know who you’re even talking to?
“I was invited to a house-warming BBQ. It was hosted by some distant relatives of mine, and when I got there, I found an interesting and diverse group of people, around 30 in all. There were some family members I knew, but also friends of my relatives and neighbors whom I had never met before.
I am a natural extrovert and a gregarious person, and I enjoy meeting new people, especially people from different backgrounds who may have something to teach me!
At the time I was in my mid-40’s, but I guess I dress quite young, so the 30s-something man who approached me may have assumed I was younger.
I was dressed very casually in jeans and a t-shirt as it was a warm summer day.
He was very well-dressed in a jacket and business pants and had quite an arrogant air about him. He came straight up to me, looked me up and down, and then said: “Hello, what’s your name, and what do you do?’ Blunt approach, but that’s OK.
I can cope in most social situations. I told him my name was Cate and that I worked in the finance industry.
He replied, ‘So, you do data entry, do you?’
I replied, ‘Yes, that’s a part of my job.’
He then proceeded to tell me that he had just bought the newest version of Excel, and that it was brilliant! He told me he had just spent days teaching himself how to use Excel, including all the latest functions and advanced formulas.
He said if I wanted to, I could go around to his house (next door), and he would teach me how to use Excel. ‘You never know, it might improve your career opportunities and help you get a better job!’ he finished with a flourish.
By this time, I was a little uncomfortable with the lack of body space between us – he was a classic ‘space invader.’ And I wasn’t too comfortable with being invited back to his house after a casual two-minute conversation, especially as I was a married woman who lived 40kms from my relatives.
So I politely replied: ‘Thank you for the offer, but my life is quite busy at the moment.’ I thought that was sufficient a hint – but NO!
‘But you should take every opportunity to learn new skills!’ he informed me. ‘If you just remain in the same old rut, doing the same thing every day, you’ll never get anywhere and achieve your dreams,’ he said.
My patience was being sorely tested and I began to plan my escape, but I was not quick enough. ‘Excel is a fantastic program!’ he continued, ‘Once you get to know the basics, you’ll be able to add long columns of numbers in a fraction of the time it takes to add them up manually! And you’ll be able to calculate fractions and do some really complicated analysis – all with just a few simple formulas!’
He opened his mouth to continue his condescending lecture about the merits of using a basic spreadsheet, but I’d had enough.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘But I really don’t have the time to teach you VBA coding at the moment. I’m a stock market CFD trader with a current portfolio in excess of $3M, and my current clients take up all my available time.’
With that, I walked off to find a better company.
The look on his face was priceless!
Moral of the story? Please don’t judge anyone based on their looks or your uneducated first impressions of them.”
12. Hairdressers Aren't Idiots
“I have been a hairdresser at a high-end salon for several years.
From experience, I can safely say that most people believe hairdressers to be unintelligent. I have had people say the most passive insulting remarks questioning my abilities, knowledge, training, experience, and professional opinion.
I just had to shrug them off and prove them wrong by doing a darn good job coloring and cutting their hair.
After doing hair for some time, I decided to go back to college to get my bachelor’s degree.
I was a mediocre student growing up and struggled to even make B’s in most of my classes.
When I went back to college, I had to cut my salon hours down to 30 hours a week so I could be a full-time student. When I started telling my clients that my hours would be changing because I was going back to college, their responses lit a fire in me.
Most of them laughed and asked why I would want to do that and some of them were confused, but very few were genuinely happy for me.
What shocked me the most was when I told them what major I chose: Accounting. This was the most common response I received: ‘Oh wow, you must be smart then?’ It became clear to me, right then and there, my clients believed that up until that moment, I was still just a dumb hairdresser.
I don’t remember how I responded the first time I heard that, but it truly hurt my feelings. The conversations I had with my clients while they were in my chair started to change. My clients started to talk to me about more, ‘scholarly’ subjects like history, government, business, etc.
New clients would immediately change their demeanor as soon as I told them I was in college for accounting.
My clients stopped talking to me like I was stupid and started talking to me like a normal human.
Fast forward three years: I graduated cum laude from an awesome university with an Accounting degree.
I won multiple scholarships from various CPA firms. I made mostly A’s in all my classes and even a 100 average in some. I had multiple job offers from CPA firms before graduation.
Over the past few months, I have been reminding my clients that I will be leaving the hair industry for public accounting and it secretly brings me joy to know how stressed they are about finding a new hairdresser.
Yesterday was my last day at the salon and I start my accounting career in a month!
Moral of the story: 1) Don’t let anyone make you feel stupid. If they do, then prove them wrong.
2) Don’t be rude to your hairdresser because one day they might be doing your taxes or auditing your company.
Karma is a beautiful bee with an itch.”
Another User Comments:
“Well done on your determination!
I have to say though that people who do not respect hairdressers are just stupid. They don’t respect anyone, not just hairdressers. They may pretend to respect them just because they have to but they are ready to talk behind their backs.
I personally have total respect for hairdressers.
I love to watch them cut my hair, brush it and make it look great. I also ask them millions of questions and I am so astonished how much expertise they have about types of hair, treatments and blow dry. After almost 35 years of practice on myself, I still don’t have a clue!!! And I have a master!” Gisella Fama
11. Even Cyclists Live In Gated Communities
“I was riding my bike into my gated neighborhood and a woman in a gray Porsche stopped, rolled down her window and yelled at me, ‘You know, this is a gated community for a reason! You should…’
Funny enough, I was wearing a face mask that resembles Harley Quinn (to protect from sun, bugs and pollution).
So, I pull down my mask, smile politely and say, ‘I know, I live here, Wonderwoman.’
At that point the gate was open so I rode on in. But, here’s the sick part…
She intentionally accelerated and sped past me so dangerously close that I thought I was going to crash!
Being the person I am, I followed her to her home but since I can only ride about 25 mph, and she was speeding at 40+ on a residential street, I had to ask a man on the street if he saw her and where she went.
He told me, and I reported her to the community HOA and to the police.
She got a letter of complaint from the police and the HOA has her on the watch for future offenses.
There’s never a good reason to threaten a human being with an automobile, even if you think you are better than them.”
Another User Comments:
“This made me so mad.
How satisfying, though, that you were able to report the little butthead and witness her paying a consequence or two. Really glad you’re okay. Two summers ago, I was hit while sitting at a light and was sent sailing into an intersection. The driver ran.
My truck was totaled, and now I have no vehicle. As both a pedestrian and a cyclist, I am dealing with people who are too busy texting to be bothered with driving on a daily basis.
Last summer, I was riding, and I had an unfortunate encounter at the corner of a side street and a busy thoroughfare, with an overly made-up young woman who almost hit me, because she was texting.
I got upset, of course, instructed her to lower her window, then said, in my best cold dead voice, “PUT YOUR PHONE DOWN.”
She didn’t like that, and when I started to peddle my bike again, she jetted forward like she was going to hit me, then abruptly stopped.
Yeah! Totally serious! I fell, my bike fell on top of me, she started LAUGHING, went AROUND me in the street and booked. Oh my God, even typing this is upsetting. Because it happened close to my house, I watched for her anytime I was on Harper (the busy road it happened on) and that side street.” Audra Erin
10. They Look Like They'll Rob The Place, But They Can Afford Diamonds
“This past February was my daughter’s 16th Birthday.
We had planned a big Sweet 16 party but not until June, when the weather would be nicer.
My husband and I had talked about what to get her for her birthday. We had decided on a necklace with diamonds, something she could wear even as an adult, which she was fast becoming, and a two-week trip to Scotland.
We own a farm and like to do most of our own fencing and gardening but big jobs we hire out.
The night before her birthday we realized that neither of us had been to the jeweler’s (I don’t know how that got away from us.) We looked at the clock and noticed we only had 20 minutes to get to the jewelers before they closed.
Jumping into our farm truck, we sped into town, making it to the jeweler’s 5 minutes before closing. We walked in with muddy boots, dirty jeans, heavy jackets, sporting windblown hair.
Needless to say, they did not like how we looked.
My husband informed them we were looking for a gift for our daughter’s birthday.
Nervously, we were directed to a case which had not been put away yet. There were thin and simple, gold and silver chains barren of any gemstones. We told the sales lady again what we wanted. They pulled out trays with thin gold and silver necklaces and small trinkets on them.
The manager was standing in the background nervously watching us.
My husband was getting a little annoyed. He said to the lady, ‘Look, this is my daughter’s 16th birthday, not her 6th. I don’t want to see anything under $500. And I want it to have diamonds on it.’ She looked at him like a deer with headlights coming at it, then walked over to the manager.
While they were whispering together, I said to my husband in an elevated voice, ‘Don’t get upset. They don’t know we were working outside all day on the farm. We probably look like we’re going to hold up the place.’ My husband snickered.
The manager overheard me, eyeing me to see if it might be true. He sent the woman to the back. He locked the door.
The sales lady and manager brought out trays of necklaces more like what we were looking for. The manager explained to us that they had been closing up when we came in, they were sorry for the inconvenience.
We looked at the necklaces with diamonds picking out a sterling silver necklace with a heart with diamonds. It was $1,250.
The manager apologized again, said they were having a sale starting in a few days for Valentine’s Day and would be happy to give us the discount for all the inconvenience, which was 25%.
My husband and I just stared at him, not saying a word. The manager became uncomfortable, stuttering and stammering.
My husband said, of course, he could do better than that because of the inconvenience, how long all of this had taken, etc. We ended up getting 45% off.
When my husband paid for the necklace, he pulled out a stack of $100 bills. Many more than he needed. He handed the manager the money and said to me, ‘brought $1600, $100 for every year. Would you like something as a gift for being such a great mother for 16 years?’ I declined.
The manager was quickly realizing his mistake and was trying to backpedal, offering us their sale ad for Valentine’s Day, trying to get our email, offered preferred private buying times, asking me to fill out a wish list, etc. We declined everything, took our necklace, and left.
Our daughter loved the necklace and the Scotland trip is scheduled for the spring.”
Ironically enough, my husband ended up getting my engagement ring at the first jeweler but different location. We went back to the location he got the engagement ring from to look at wedding bands. The person who worked with us then was not very helpful. So we left, and went to the one other location I knew of to see them. We were both greeted right away, and we explained what just happened at the other location. Turns out the woman that helped us was the manager at the location we just came from. But she waited until after we told her what happened before she told us she was their manager. It was great! And she was very helpful. At one point someone needed a manager to do something, but she stayed with us until someone else freed up so she could then go assist on whatever the issue was (she asked us if we were ok with that, and we were).
9. New Employee? Yeah, If You Think 15 Years Is "New"
Wow, that’s awkward.
“Once, late in my tenure as a Dangerous Goods Specialist at my station, I was filling in for another employee and picking up packages at a customer location. I noticed they had made several errors on their Dangerous Goods shipment. Not wanting to haul the items to my station then go through the process of rejecting the packages which would require the packages to be returned to the customer to be fixed, I told the customer there were errors, and I was unable to accept the packages.
The customer was also the shipping manager and she said for me to just take them and let the specialist decide if there was a problem, after all, she told me, a mere driver wouldn’t understand the process, especially a ‘new’ one like myself.
I politely informed her that I was a 15-year employee and had been a Dangerous Goods specialist for 11 years. I went on to inform her that I was intimately familiar with her company since I was the one who had been rejecting her shipments on a regular basis for the past few years for errors just like the ones I had noted.
She babbled something about how her shipments were fine by German standards (her company was German and she had a noticeable accent), to which I responded that the rules were international; so no, they weren’t okay by German standards either.
In the end, she huffed that she would need me to wait for half an hour while she fixed things and created new paperwork.
I informed her that I had already been at her location too long and had other customers to take care of.
When I left, I heard her saying something in German that was presumably a tirade of curses.
And no, her processes never improved, so I typically rejected 3 out of 4 shipments from her company over the next few years as a DG specialist.”
8. Sorry, But She Was More Qualified For The Job, To Your Surprise
“I had recently been hired to teach mathematics (under the auspices of a credentialed teacher) to the mathematically most gifted 5th-grade students when a mother of a child who was not chosen for the program, and with whom I had a shaky relationship because of some things the PTA chose to do when I was its president (things like fund an after-school program, get the bylaws up to date and to the state PTA standard and pay for field trip scholarships for kids who couldn’t afford to go otherwise) approached me.
She was livid that I had been chosen without her having had the opportunity to apply. Not my fault. I applied, I was chosen. Period.
At that point, she had the nerve to ask me if I even had a degree. I was flabbergasted.
I have a BA in Mathematics, a BS in Computer Science, and an MS in Mathematical Computer Science. I got my undergraduate degrees in three years and graduated summa cum laude.
My Master’s was also with honors.
I worked as a mathematical computer scientist at a national laboratory for a decade and continued to consult for them for the past 28 years after ending full-time employment due to severe repetitive strain syndrome.
I told the woman (who, at the time, had only one bachelor’s degree but has since gotten a master’s in education administration) that I not only had a degree, but I would see her degree and raise her two.
She wanted details, but I told her it was none of her business.
The school district had copies of my transcripts and was satisfied that I was more than qualified to teach the class, and it was excited about the program I had put together for the kids.
I taught those 10- to 11-year-old kids the 5th to the 7th-grade curriculum.
Additionally, we covered eight weeks of special topics in mathematics from a hands-on and purely conceptual approach.
We touched on probability theory, number theory, topology, Boolean algebra and symbolic logic, and a few other topics. Additionally, every Friday after our weekly quiz we would play mathematical games and puzzles.
The students I taught all jumped straight from my 5th-grade classroom into Algebra and, since then, have all gotten degrees (and some have pursued advanced degrees) in STEM areas. They were the brightest, most motivated, wonderful kids I have ever had the pleasure of knowing.
As for the kid whose mom accosted me, all I will say is she did not fare nearly as well. With a mom like that, I am not overly surprised.”
7. Oh, She Can Afford A Taxi; She Owns A Mercedes
“I get a lot of these, but this short story is one of the sweetest I’ve experienced.
I worked at a very busy office. With summer being high season, they needed me, or the chaos would ruin the whole day (at a time, when even organized days were a nightmare to go through).
I was very valued.
But the busy day before made me so tired, so I went to sleep straight after arriving home.
In the morning, I got up, the car was dead, the battery was dead. I’d left the car’s lights on overnight. I had no one to turn to.
Living in a village where I needed over an hour to get to any public transportation, I had to call a taxi company. It went like this:
‘Hello. I need a taxi from (address) to the city. When will it be here?’
‘You need a taxi?!’
‘Yes, when will it be here? I need to get to the city now.’
‘But you can’t have a taxi.’
‘Why not?’
‘A taxi is expensive.’
‘What?!’
‘It costs too much, you can’t afford it.’
‘I can’t afford a taxi?’ I said, my eyes widened, and I was staring at my irresponsive Mercedes.
‘No, you can’t. It costs too much.’
‘Oh, thank you for telling me I can’t afford a taxi. Bye.’
I didn’t feel the need to explain to that operator that I DO take taxis, when I need them, that I’m aware of the prices, and that I even worked at the reservation office of a taxi company, and I knew what routes they drove.
The distance from my village to the city wasn’t that big!
I called my boss to tell him that my Mercedes’ battery was dead, that I must sound too young on the phone, that a woman had to explain to me that taxis were too expensive for me to afford, and I was going to somehow get to the office after two hours because I’d walk to the next village to get a train to the city.
He said they’d make it without me for about an hour, since I couldn’t afford a taxi, laughing.
Seriously, she judged the situation of my finances by my voice.”
6. You Can Be Beautiful And Smart At The Same Time
“I am a very learned woman because of my photographic memory and speed reading abilities. I have read textbooks of over 1,000 pages in 24 hours, can recall excerpts verbatim, and pass an exam on the topic as much as 2 months or more out from having learned the material.
I have taken those online IQ Tests and ALWAYS come out between 132 and 175 depending on the test.
Because of my appearance (I have dyed my hair blonde off and on for the better part of my adult life, have been told I’m very attractive and enjoy wearing makeup and dressing where I gladly flaunt my assets!) and lack of college degree, I have been told many condescending things relative to my intelligence, outward appearance and choice and tastes.
I was working as an Administrative Assistant for a powder coating company, and one of the owners said, ‘If I knew in the interview you were smart and not just a piece of meat, I would have NEVER hired you! I just wanted a hot face to look at from time to time in the office!’ right before he told me to leave for the day and not return except to pick up my check Friday!
I went home, crying to my abusive, narcissistic EX for him to say, ‘Maybe you shouldn’t have been such a know-it-all! I’ve told you for years that you should ‘don’t think when you think and think when you don’t.’ Now you’ve messed up another job, and I’ll have to pick up more shifts at the bar again, STUPID WITCH!”
5. They Treat Him Like Garbage Until He Dresses Nicely
“I frequent a Japanese branded convenience store near my workplace to get cheap meals (like $0.50 cheap). The lines are always long and understandably, the staff is rather cranky, especially during the morning rush hour.
I’m not a top boss or anything, but I am in a position to be able to decide things in the company I work for.
I usually get really crappy service, and my turn can go for as long as 10 minutes, with missed orders (yeah, you can order stuff like food in that convenience store), wrong orders, and even wrong prices rang up!
One day though, it was a rather cold day, so I wore some random cheapo jacket.
It just happens that my dad was one of the top executives who brought the Japanese brand to the country, hence he got one.
I walk into the store as usual, and it also happens that I had a meeting to go to that day, so I wore a rather nice dress shirt and pants.
Basically, I looked like someone from that convenience store’s company who can boss people around. To my surprise, the cashier called my attention, and asked what I wanted – with five people in front of me in the queue! I didn’t mind it at first, trying to think it wasn’t me, but then she went at it again and she made eye contact.
Noticing now that they probably think I was an executive of the company they’re working for, I tried to make a semi-stern voice and told them along the lines of “No, it’s unfair to the people who are in front of me in the line.
Serve them first.” That shut them up and their faces looked rather ashamed. I’m not sure it’s because they realized that what I said was the right thing to do, or their bones are shaking because they think they’re not able to prioritize a company executive during rush hour, which shouldn’t be an issue.
I finally arrived at the counter, and placed my items for checkout, and made a couple of orders too.
The next day, I didn’t wear a jacket, and I got the same crap service again.”
4. Not Just Wealthy Parents Care About Their Kids' Education
‘The year before my son started kindergarten, his father and I had ended our unhealthy and volatile relationship.
As a result of the trauma of our relationship, separation, and subsequent custody battle, my son began acting out at school. He also struggled with reading and writing.
As a single mother, I was doing all I could to support my children emotionally, mentally, and financially. I was also attending school full time to finish my degree.
At a conference with his teacher and the school counselor in reference to his behavior and his below-average reading abilities, I was asked if I ‘had books in my home.’
Now at the time, my children and I were classified as low-income and my son received free lunches at school.
However, this was only due to my status as a full-time student. I was working to finish my BA in sociology, so I knew exactly why I was asked if I had books in my home.
Their thinking, I’m sure, went something like this: low-income single mom, probably uneducated, must not have the wherewithal to support her children’s education at home, doesn’t understand the importance of reading with her children to foster literacy.
I wanted to ask the counselor if foundations of interpersonal communication or basic helping skills were required classes when she was working on her master’s degree. I wanted to ask her if she knew just how condescending that question is. I wanted to tell her that even if I didn’t have an education and a history of well-paying jobs, questions like this are not really helpful in supporting children or their parents.
I wanted to ask her what if I said no, I don’t have books in my home. What would you have said then?
Instead, I just nodded and said, ‘Yes, we do have books in our home, and we try to read before bed each night.’
At that point, I didn’t have the energy to educate someone who should already know better.
P.S. This was several years ago, and my son and I have both attended private counseling to work through this difficult period in our lives. He currently reads at grade level and has had few behavioral issues at school.”
3. Actually, They Can Afford That House
“In a matter of seconds, my husband and I went from being the annoying couple to recipients of undivided attention.
Now we are not that wealthy but we were just better than what the concerned person had thought us to be.
When we had no children to hog our leisure time, my husband and I loved looking at houses.
In this age of the World Wide Web, when “window” shopping has acquired a whole new meaning, we skimmed through real estate websites and occasionally inspected a house that caught our fancy.
On one such spree, we were checking out a massive 5 bedroom house… no, a palace! The floor was marble, the lounge had no end, multiple living spaces, multiple outdoor entertaining areas, the views, walk-in pantry… basically the works.
We were probably the youngest couple in a stream of interested viewers. The agent was trying his best to scan through the crowd and find someone who was interested enough to be considered a potential buyer.
He completely overlooked us and we really didn’t mind that.
However, as we were inspecting the property we had questions and we kept going back to him while he was busy gauging everyone’s interest.
After a couple of questions, he was visibly annoyed. He walked over to us and said, “So is this going to be your first house? I must tell you the owner is expecting nothing less than a million for the property.”
Now we’d been to enough inspections to know that usually, agents wait for you to get emotionally attached to the property before touching vaguely on the price.
My husband said, “Oh no! We live in our own house and have a little investment property on the side. We are not looking to buy yet but a bit of market research doesn’t hurt.”
He apologized for making the assumption and immediately his face became softer and charming.
He started giving us a tour but we gently told him that although it was a dream home, it wasn’t for us, at least not then.
We never really discussed it and I don’t think either of us was offended. It’s almost as if we’ve agreed it’s bound to happen.
Whatever happened to ‘Don’t judge a book by its cover’?”
If they're serious buyers, then they will already have a pre-approval letter from their bank/lending institution and know what their financial limits are. If they're paying cash, they have their proof of funds available.
Any agent that judges by how a person looks isn't going to be successful in their job. Looks are deceiving, the proof is in the numbers.
Those kinds of agents make the rest of us look bad.
2. He Washes Dishes, But He's Actually Rich
“Back in 2004 at the height of the real estate bubble, I was an extremely successful real estate broker making over $500K US a year and managing about 20 agents, all of whom were super successful, earning millions of dollars in commissions.
I was living in a multi-million dollar mansion and driving around town in my fancy sports car with the top down.
I felt on top of the world nothing could stop me! I was IT!!
One day I got home and it just hit me.
I walked in and suddenly I felt alone, in a really big house with no real friends, no purpose and I asked myself, is this it? What if this is not who I’m supposed to be? What does it feel like to have real friends? A woman who truly loves me for who I am? Even though I was self-made, all these questions made me feel such emptiness inside to a point that I could no longer ignore.
These questions were eating at me and on my mind constantly. So I decided to do something about it; I left my top guy in charge of my business and I left for six months.
So I moved to a nearby city where no one knew me and I got a job at Joe’s Crab Shack as a dishwasher.
A very humbling experience to say the least.
I have never done hard labor a day in my life but I was I believe the best dishwasher that place ever saw. At first, employees were offensively impolite to me, making fun of me and talking behind my back because I was the new guy and most were longtime employees.
There were cliques and I didn’t fit in in any of them just like in high school.
In business, I had learned that respect is earned and not given and so I let my hard work speak for itself.
Little by little, I started gaining people’s trust and they started warming up to me.
They started sharing with me all of their personal and financial troubles and tribulations. I heard some crazy sad, really sad stories regarding child support, living pay-check to pay-check, not being able to afford a car, a house, rent, food, clothes, etc., pretty much everything in life which I had been taking for granted up until that point.
I also met genuinely friendly, sincere happy people who enriched my life in more ways than one. These were all real people with real feelings and real problems and I was in the middle of it all – it was exactly what I was searching for (I met my beautiful future wife there too)!
After a few months, my new set of acquaintances started getting suspicious of me since no one really knew who I was or where I came from so the pressure was building.
After thinking really hard and going back and forth with myself, I finally decided to invite everyone over to my birthday party at my real house so I could reveal who I really was.”
1. My Ex Treated Me Differently When She Saw That I Now Own A Restaurant
I can’t afford you? I can now, but now I’m too good for you.
“It was during my school days. I actually was pretty broke back then. I had no car or motorcycle. I used to move around in public buses. Mum and dad were underpaid school teachers.
I asked her if she would like to go out with me sometime.
A long story short summary of the response was, ‘You cannot afford me,’ which to be honest, was the bitter truth. Fast forward 20 years, I own 8 fine dining restaurants in the same city.
One fine evening, she walks into one of my restaurants with her now-husband. I decided to serve them myself. Mind it, she has no idea I own the place. And this is one of the top-rated places in the city. She assumes that I work as a waiter.
She places her order to me without saying any greetings. Now when the couple asked for the cheque I told her it was on the house; We are so delighted to have them here.
They leave happy knowing they won’t have to pay a penny.
Next week, they decided to visit again. This time they saw me parking my Merc ML350 outside the restaurant (darn costly in my country) and the security guard saluting and opening the door for me. When I went to the table, they were seated for me to be their server again today.
This time she was very ‘excited’ to see me. Asked about my family and introduced me to her husband. She asked me about the restaurant; I told her I own the place.
They teased me, saying that I have forgotten who my friends are since I have become a big man now.
I smiled and ignored the statement. I gave her the menu and then it struck her it was not a coincidence that the restaurant was named ‘Minakshi’s kitchen.’ I could see the expression change on her face, and it was priceless.
Her name was Minakshi, so the restaurant was actually named after her.”
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