Heat of the moment

In the bank today, a little queue waited patiently. Three cashier windows were populated, but only two were serving - the closest cashier was immersed in paperwork. My turn came along, and I went to the affable guy at the middle window, and handed over my no-longer-legal-tender £20 notes to be swapped for working ones.

Cashier Guy greeted me pleasantly, and was poised to count out my new notes when a woman appeared at the window where Paperwork Lady was not open for business.

"Yes," she declared loudly, "I was hoping to be served by this lovely gentlemen..."

[indicating my cashier - and for a moment I believed her words]

"...who seems so happy to yawn while he's serving customers..." Her loudness was anger, which instantly filled the small bank.

[Cashier Guy froze and stared, bills fanned in his hand, totally taken aback. I willed breath, peace, patience, calm - whatever - for him. I willed all the same for her.]

"...and shows no interest at all in what he's doing. All he does is..."

Like I said, loud and angry. Calculated to disrupt to the max.

Cashier Guy took a breath, turned back to me and confirmed, ever so professionally: "Sixty pounds, madam?" With steady hands, he dealt the notes out, and said he hoped I had a good day. I left with her voice resounding, in full flow.

Now, maybe he is a total wreck of a bank clerk. Maybe 95% of the time, he yawns and doodles and makes critical mistakes that mean folk miss their mortgage payments. And maybe he needs support or formal warnings or firing. Who knows? Because what happened today won't address any of that. There's a difference between complaint and humiliation; each seek distinct and different outcomes. When we speak in anger - even if we're telling the absolute truth - all others tend to hear is our anger.

I wondered if Angry Lady left feeling glad that she had spoken her mind, satisfied that she'd set that wrong right. Maybe it took a huge amount of courage to walk in there, point out that she had been mistreated. Maybe it helped. Maybe her heart was lighter as a result. Or maybe the anger continued to feed, like fire catching, through her day - through other thoughts, other encounters...