The Pandemic's Not Over but We Have Tacos: A Call for More Patience & Compassion

After about 20 minutes in the Taco Bell drive-through line, the woman in front of us got out of her car and appeared outside my window. I didn't have a mask on so I left the window up. She was trying to see if people could back out so she could leave. I glanced in the rear-view mirror and saw that there was at least one car behind ours. "There's no way I can move," I apologized.

"Get back in the car!" She snapped at the kiddo who'd climbed out of the backseat.

A few minutes later, she came back and told us the restaurant was closing early. Weird, we thought. But ok. I put the car in reverse and we backed out so that she could exit. We deliberated for a minute in a nearby parking lot, saw that the Taco Bell line was, in fact, inching along, and decided to wait our turn. We weren't in a hurry, so it was fine.

Finally it was our turn to order, and we could hear the woman who'd said they were closing, now inside the restaurant and screaming at the people working. We rolled up, paid, and got our drinks. After about 15 minutes, the guy who'd taken my payment apologized for the long wait, saying they were short-staffed and thanking us for our patience. I told him it wasn't a problem.

Working a minimum-wage job is miserable and not something folks generally do by choice. Being abused by impatient customers adds insult to injury. The least we can do, and I do mean the least, is to be kind. And if you can't muster kindness, then say nothing. Better yet, take a breath. And I realize saying "take a breath" is like telling someone who's all worked up to calm down -- ineffective and even counterproductive.

But what happened next, after we'd gotten our food (along with four unexpected coupons for tacos, to thank us for not being assholes - imagine, that we should be rewarded for the minimum of acceptable behavior), reinforced this problem of not breathing, not pausing, not thinking about our impact on the people around us, the people waiting on us, the people driving near us, the people we bump up against in so many ways as we all move through our days.

I was leaving the parking lot -- one of those exits that's a one-way, right-turn only -- and a car came barreling towards us. I instinctively leaned on my horn and held up a finger as our cars passed each other. Not THE finger, mind you, just A finger, as in "ONE" as in "ONE-WAY." One finger, as in, take a breath. Had my car been all of 10 feet further into the turn lane, our cars would have collided head-on.

I write this as someone who has done (does) more than my fair share of barreling around. More than my fair share of not pausing. And more than my fair share of wanting what I want when I want it. (Last week, I even had a dream in which I inhabited a child's version of myself and literally had a tantrum. I don't remember the details, but I do remember the feeling, which was I DON'T LIKE THAT AND I DON'T WANT THAT AND THIS ISN'T WHAT I WANT AND I WANT THINGS THE WAY I WANT THEM. Whew. It really was like that!)

My pandemic fatigue as of late has been at odds with the wiser and more conscientious part of myself -- the grown part, really -- that knows that waiting can be hard, enduring prolonged limitations not of our own making is hard, and caring for others' needs and wellbeing in addition to our own desires is part of being a mature, caring human. Damn that maturity thing. Or bless that maturity thing. Guess it all depends on your perspective.

It sure feels like the world outside my bubble has returned to "normal," which was never sustainable to begin with, never really oriented towards the human, the animal body Mary Oliver wrote of so astutely as a poet who spent hours each day paying attention. I don't want this normal. I don't want to be in such a hurry that I put other people's beings and bodies at risk. I don't want to be a selfish asshole. And that doesn't mean I don't have my own inner selfish asshole -- maybe we all do, maybe that, too, is part of this intricate human condition.

What it does mean, though, is seeing where I have a choice about how I relate. Having a shitty day does not entitle you to abuse someone else. Absolutely every single person we encounter is going through some shit. How do we extend patience and compassion when we are so fried? When our reserves are paper thin?

I don't have any big answers here, because these aren't the kinds of questions that have answers, not the way 2+2 has an answer. But I also think that in some fundamental way, it's not actually that hard. The hardest part of all may be remembering to extend that very patience and compassion to ourselves, a part of the non-equation that's all too easy to forget.

Pause.

Breathe.

Slow down.

"Are we there yet?" The child in me whines. I miss traveling. I miss gathering. I miss ease and saying yes to things. I turn to her and say, "Not yet, lovey. But we are here, and we are together, and we're still doing our part to care for others, too. Plus, now we have tacos."

For the moment, this seems to satisfy her longing for something different to get here faster. And for me, well, it reminds me that faster is not the goal at all. But kinder? Yes, please. To ourselves and each other.