On Independence

Yesterday, pulling into Fleet Farm around 5:30pm for an item or two, I noticed the garage was open until 8pm. Only one bay open, and no workers in sight. Usually, they run at least an hour or two wait time. I checked with the woman working the auto desk, and she confirmed that while they only had one guy on, he didn't have any tickets up and there was not much wait. So I left my keys for the tires to be balanced and rotated, and went in to shop briefly.

My car was up when I entered the waiting room. Behind the bay, an older truck and boat trailing behind, had parallel parked across all the bays. Meanwhile, I caught the woman who had written up my ticket, while she was out looking at the size of the trailer tire to sell to the guy inside.

He was a real work. Called out to the guy servicing my car -- say, I want to get this new one on and it's needs a bit of air. Can I give you $10 to just get me out of here real quick. The mechanic just laughed, said he'd get to it, and kept on balancing my tires. The guy asked -- should I leave this here (new tire) or do I take it to pay for it. Since you don't pay for anything in the garage, the mechanic said, "Take it up to the front and pay for it first."

Now, 2 things: When I saw the woman outside, before the guy even came in, I walked over and asked her: "Say, ok to tip this guy a few bucks?" It was humid out there, a holiday weekend, and mostly I thought of it since my job was "free" = I bought my tires there with lifetime rotation. She just shook her head, and said it's against the policy, which makes sense. That was why it was so funny, a few minutes later, to hear the guy call out his offer.

Under his breath, as he lifted my tires back on, the mechanic said he was going to ask for $20. He was kidding, in that mechanic way, but I can see where if you haven't been around blue-collar humor much, you might be inclined to take everything literally. Don't.

Second, when I had returned to the garage area after shopping, there was one other fellow sitting waiting, and other had come in, ticket in hand, to pick up his vehicle that had been serviced earlier. So when the boat guy returns, he's not just talking to one guy in the garage, with a customer standing outside the bay, casually watching and listening. He goes out into the garage, interrupts the mechanic now using the air gun to tighten my lug nuts, and shows him a business card from where he works, explaining how he's going to "take care" of him. I assume he worked at, or owned, a restaurant or other such place.

So, I did it. I spoke up. Calmy, respectfully. With two men waiting at the desk behind me (my car was almost done; I was just waiting on the keys.) The mechanic had called me over to show me one of my lugnuts was almost stripped, and on my way back to the desk, I just mentioned to the long-haired, bearded and sandaled, almost hippie-type looking guy, "That's not cool to tip your way to the front of the line. When he's working on my car, I want his full attention to be ... on my car." (He was having a little trouble earlier balancing one of the tires, so it wasn't as routine a procedure as maybe I'm leading you to believe.)

The guy laughed it off, a bit. "I'm paying him $100, you know." and then, "Look, I could do this myself (fill the air) if he'd just let me use the tools." I was serious, and not upset since I was on my way out. Just wanted to get speak up, get that off my chest.

I said, "That's between you and him. All I know is, I want to drive out of here in confidence, knowing that when he was working on my car, he was paying full attention to his work. That's not right, you jumping in when he's working on something else. That's why there's a no tipping policy, presumably."

The mechanic looked at me as he was lowering my car, and said, "thank you". He would have taken the $10, I'm sure of it, and if the shop had been as slow as it originally seemed, it wouldn't have been a big thing. But why push your luck with the special treatment, when you can look back into the faces of the people waiting their turn?
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As for me, on the road again... Big fleamarket weekend, doncha know?

Happy Independence Day! If you've got it, cherish it. If you don't, keep working for it. You'll know when you achieve it -- it's more a feeling of lightness and fluidity, imo, than status and power, which may explain why so many seek to firmly grasp it, yet come away empty handed. Sometimes you have to plan, and wait, and make better plans the next time after learning from the waiting. And don't forget to speak out, if you can when you can. That "thank you" was sincere, that much I know, and if it cost him a $10 tip, maybe the sight of that guy sitting waiting his turn while the folks at the desk were helped in order, was worth it. Still, with our attitudes these days, I smell more trouble ahead: You can't really buy independence, but you do pay for it. And if you can't learn to take responsibility, always expecting somebody else to take special care of you, good luck with the independence thing.