Grab-bag madness

I find it interesting how differently I act when unbelievable gangas are on the line. Seriously, once a limited supply of free or practically free goods are on the line--food, clothes, you name it--everyone goes CRAZY. One minute, I go from being a normal Christian to being a ravenous, deal-hungry animal. In the crazed stampede, everyone loses their humanity and, in turn, deprives others of theirs. In an instant, theirs is just another face, another chance to lose an all too ephemeral "deal." Really, though, what kind of deal is it when I dehumanize others? Is it worth it? Perhaps monetarily, but it is emotionally draining! Interesting...Come to think of it, dehumanization of others drains my spirit, whilst serving those very same people rejuvenates me.

I bring this up because this morning two friends and I went to a consignment clothing store that was advertising a sale where you stuff a bag as full as possible and only pay $10. In a place where everyone is notoriously late, our arrival ten minutes before opening was remarkable. But as suspected, there was already a line. Just before opening, the store employees gave a brief instruction as to how the sale worked. We soon became enveloped in a clearance article frenzy and by the time my friends and I reached the clearance racks, almost everything was picked clean.

We combined everything into one bag and managed to find satisfactory items, finally making it into line. And then we waited. Just as we neared the front counter, we realized the line serpentined, looping around another clothing rack. After more than an hour of waiting and two and a half hours after arriving, we reached the finish line. "You would've spent $98 on this purchase if it weren't for the sale," the cashier told us. Somehow, that satisfaction of having saved money we wouldn't have even spent it there hadn't been a sale wasn't quite enough to make up for the pushing, bumping, and general malhumor. Yes, we poor students came away victorious with a great deal on clothing and succeeded in not letting that unhappy, sneaky skinny girl (note how rude my thoughts became) cut us after we'd been in line for an hour, but to what end?!

Order, clarity, and a bit more consideration for others rather than selfishness for self would've made it much more pleasant. This morning's grueling ordeal made me think of a book I read once, Leadership and Self-Deception. In it, the author discusses human relationships and how we generally have a gut instinct to help others, but we often ignore that inner goodness and start dehumanizing and emphasize all their perceived flaws. We justify our "self-betrayal," the betrayal of our shared humanity and goodness. There were some kind people at the store, and they were more likely to be kind and mutually helpful when I spoke with and looked at them. In that moment, we ceased to be competitors and became teammates joined in a common goal. It's just too bad freebie experiences aren't by nature that friendly. I, for one, know that I am more forgiving of others and less judgmental when I talk to them and realize yet again that they, like me, have problems and hard times, but they have strengths and good times, too. We're all human. Huh, fancy that novel concept.