Humanity Through the Eyes of a Cashier

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The bright lights and constant noise is enough to drive even the most grounded person insane. First time cashiers have nightmares about checking all night long.

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Cashiers see and hear a lot. You ask a seasoned cashier what would surprise them and they'd likely laugh at you. Being a cashier will make you strong. . .or break you.

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Having been a cashier since before I could reach the register without a stool, I'm one of those who would laugh at you. I've seen and heard things that sometimes eat me up inside and even fewer times, brightens my day.

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People spend more time at grocery stores than most other places. You see more kinds of people in a grocery store than anywhere else, because while not everyone has to clothes shop or buy games and toys, everyone has to eat. Maybe my veiw is skewed and biased but I like to believe that most of what I glean from my job is mostly observation. This is humanity through the eyes of a cashier.

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I often times wonder why people would treat others as though they are disgusting animials just because they are in a service feild. I've been treated like I was worse than a soaking wet mut with rabies before, for no reason. Yeah, maybe they had a bad day but that's no excuse for taking it out on perfectly innocent strangers. Sometimes I think that at least one year in a service field should be required for everyone. Being treated like that might just change some people's heinous behavior. But as much as I'd hope this, I am left doubting it more strongly. Why is it that I doubt the ability of the general population of humanity to learn from their experiences? Because I've seen it, and it makes me very sad.

I'm also left wondering why you would walk into anywhere and trash the place. I've seen customers, young and old, stash things that they've descided they didn't want in magazine racks, behind things on shelves, and in the candy. It seems to never cross their minds that maybe they can hand them to us to put up. One of my greatest irritaions would be the cold stuff. People know that it has to be kept cold but when they all of a sudden descide they don't want it, this fact never seems to cross their minds.

I see people who are barely able to afford essentials for living while other people are gluttonously spending foodstamps on junk food and putting up the food that is actually good for you when they're short on money. I've seen parents treat their children like dogs and children who walked all over their parents. I've seen extremely rich people steal for the thrill and poor people scrape up as much as they can to just get by.

I'm a cashier and I see and hear a lot. I'll tell you that humanity's not looking too good to me. While the young seem to be getting less and less educated and more disrespectful and arrogant, the old seem to become more and more out of touch with reality and the times. Price of living just keeps going up and those of us who were born poor, stay poor no matter how hard we fight to climb out of that hole. Those who were born middle class are slowly sliding down the rungs of the social ladder to lower class. The only people who seem to be able to make it and keep making it are those who have had money their whole life. No matter how short things become, they seem to still have money. With the state of affairs today in America I'm left wondering if America's going anywhere but down.

And I see all of this from behind the checkstand. As I scan your groceries I pick up on your family life, financial situations, work ethic, and morals. I learn how well you take care of yourself and your finances. I see when you care so little about life that you would stuff yourself with junk and have nothing better to do but bad mouth people you do not know. Like the bartender, the cashier knows more about their customers sometimes than the customers know themselves.

This is humanity through the eyes of a cashier. . .

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