The Over-Friendly Barista

Here is the Northwest, we LOVE our coffee…

And yeah, I know, Starbucks took over the world and kinda let our little “secret” about the hot water and beans out of the bag… But that’s okay.

Anyway, we have TONS of these drive-thru coffee places up here where you can get everything from a REALLY strong cup of coffee to the sweetest “foo-foo” sugary drink that you can imagine.

And yes, this goes along with the “snack-sized” life I talked about the other day… ALMOST in the same context…

But enough of that, back to my story.

I was in a close-by town and pulled into the coffee place. With a couple dollars in my hand I rolled down the window in anticipation of getting the hot “pick me up” that I wanted so bad…

The Barista was a good looking guy in his mid-20’s who immediately started asking me a thousand questions… Like “What are you doing today?”, “How often do you come here?” and everything else you could think of in the 30 seconds it takes to pour a cup of coffee.

It was almost unbearable because it was felt like he was being overly friendly on purpose.

I INSTANTLY started to make up a story in my head: Maybe he was having a great day and this was how it was coming out… Maybe he just got yelled at by his boss and needed to work on his “customer service” skills…

Really, for me, I felt almost patronized that he was being WAYYY too friendly. I felt myself starting to actually get offended by his over the top questions and seemingly (to me) “fake” concern.
I answered what I thought was appropriate and went on my way.

But it stuck with me… And it actually made a negative impression on me!

And this got me thinking… Can you really feel the “motivation” behind someone’s request? Can you get a “vibe” or a sense of something that doesn’t feel right?

Of course the answer is yes…

Okay, you might be asking yourself, how does this apply to dealing with my children…
And that’s a good question.

I believe that any child above the age of about 3 can sense a sort of “tone” behind your words… or better put, they have a natural instinct when it comes to getting a “vibe” about what you’re talking about.

This doesn’t mean that they actually DO something about it, nor do they judge it, but they do have insight that can prove to be interesting.

If you doubt this, ask your child when something like this happens… Like “hmmm… do you think they really meant it?” or whatever the situation requires.

Of course this doesn’t mean that you need to watch everything you say or that everything you do is going to be placed under a microscope.

Consider this a gentle reminder that kids are smarter than we think! ha ha!

What do you think? Have you had a similar experience as I did?

So, as we’re staying true to ourselves in our language remember that we’re in this together, learning lessons along the way!

Talk to you soon,

Cliff

http://SingleParentSurvivalGuide.com