Luv & Heartbreak

I woke up after a couple of hours of sleep and try as I did to regain that coma like sleep, it eluded me.  My mind was running so I searched for the thing tickling the back of my mind and when I had located it I found it to be heartfelt sadness. 

A friend was steady on my mind, earlier in the evening, and I reached out.  The thing that was running through and tickling my mind was the expression of heartbreak that was shared and the sadness over love touched, felt, challenged and perhaps also lost (but maybe not – God is the Able One).    

Luv

See, I believe amorous love exists on two levels; a) being “in love” and b) “loving.”  I view being “in love” to include having blinders on and being totally and completely unable to acknowledge or even see the imperfections of one’s beloved.  I view “loving” to include being totally and completely aware of our beloved’s imperfections and choosing to commit and continue despite them. 

I have felt both types of love for another and would prefer “loving” to being “in love” any day.  Being “in love,” in my world is being out of control!  All that rapid heartbeat stuff; silly grinning, sweating hands and total blinders secured in place over my eyes and that eternal hope screen locked over my heart equates to a lot of stress and drama for me.  The first time I felt this type of love (19 years old and too young and dumb to be loose in the world) I didn’t even know what it was until I explained the symptoms to my pastor and he said, “oh baby you in love.”    

Ahhhhh, but “Loving,” in my world, is being chosen.  “Loving” comes with the rapid heartbeat, silly grinning, and sweaty hands but reasoning remains intact.  The little idiosyncrasies exhibited by the other is weighed and measured and a type of molding dance takes place to determine what can be changed, and what causes you intense discomfort or what you just dislike about the other (John Gottman calls this perpetual problems – and they would exist regardless of who the other was) but can still be withstood.  In other words, the perpetual problem isn’t a deal breaker.    

Slowly, the two begin to adjust to the realization that the other is and isn’t all they originally thought but the mix is such they determine they can continue as one and the commitment is born.      

You know that type of love that although we may have disagreements and at times my feelings may be hurt; I will never (okay I’m stretching it here but you get my point) have to wonder if the action or inaction was meant to jack my mind or destroy my soul.  You know, like in the infamous words of LL Cool J (shut up – the break between me and LL is a whole other blog), “back to back we can get each other through it.”  

The kind of love where not only is he watching my back; he also protects my heart.  Of course all that watching and protecting comes with a certain amount sacrifice and although sacrificing can be rough; I never ask for more than I myself am willing to give.  AND HE WILL BELIEVE, TRUST AND KNOW THIS AS A PART OF OUR TRUTH.     

I believe in this love.  I seek this love.  I want this love.

Heartbreak

But maybe heartbreak isn’t the response I actually got when I reached out.  Maybe it was my imagination, but I thought I detected raw grief in the words sent via text.

Then again, maybe it was just being able to sympathize because I too have suffered cracks and breaks in my heart as I struggled with growing and expanding and ending love relationships.  I remember a time of being so hurt I actually cried in my sleep. 

Some of what I’ve learned

·         Forever is not an infinite amount of time

·         It doesn’t matter if I ever catch you doing what I think you may be doing – the question is whether or not my needs are being met

·         To be careful in how I leave the relationship – because although I may not be able to stay I don’t want to jack his mind or destroy his soul

·         I must focus on the gains despite the loss

·         Sometimes, I can forgive (maybe even LL Cool J - smile)

·         I’m available to love for this moment in time or for all time

·         I can never love you more than I love me

I couldn’t answer the whys or how-comes for my friend.  Yes, I understand the pain involved in absorbing into oneself the belief that one’s beloved doesn’t love you; but I don’t understand how to reconcile to this gracefully.  When your world feels like it’s being torn apart – who really wants to hear that feeling abandoned, betrayed and misused by one’s beloved usually isn’t really about what we did or didn’t do; it’s their issue.       

Oh, what I wouldn’t give to be able to fix this thing for my friend; to ease or totally remove the pain; to create a safe passage to the end of this twisty turn life has thrown. 

But, in reality, to do so would be like trying to help the caterpillar become a butterfly.  As we now know, the struggle of the caterpillar enhances the beauty of the butterfly and any interference will prevent the caterpillar from becoming all it was made to be. 

The Lord will guide you continually,

And satisfy your soul in drought,

And strengthen your bones;

You shall be like a watered garden,

And like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail

Isaiah 58:11

 

POOR CUSTOMER SERVICE

Our world has become one allegedly filled with quick gratification.  Everyone is boasting “new and more efficient” everything.  I don’t know about you but I rarely find these claims to be true.  In fact, I usually find these processes to be more cumbersome than not.    

For the longest time now, I’ve tried to ignore the blatant lack of customer service in all categories of our society.  But, today was the proverbial “straw that broke the camel’s back.”  I’ve tried to ignore this because I don’t have any high blood pressure problems and don’t want to develop such problems in the future.  The bottom line is lack of good customer service makes me very ANGRY!

I admit that one’s aura can attract certain types of mishaps and openly state that I very rarely have an easy time at fast food drive- thru(s).  Over the years, I’ve “overlooked” issues with the following vendors (please note the list isn’t in order of importance or a complete list):

No longer do business with

·         Hardees on Topeka Blvd. (out of business)

·         Burger King on 10^th St.

·         Burlington Coat Factory

·         McDonald’s on California

·         Walmart auto services

·         Express Tire

I have ongoing issues with the following vendors

·         Vontage

·         Verizon

·         Chevy dealerships in Topeka and Junction City

·        Best Buy

My experiences have been so frustrating!  In fact, I’ve developed a list of frequent questions to ask when earnestly trying to ascertain “what the heck is really going on” when I get poor or bad service. 

Frequent questions

·         Do I work for you?

·         If I don’t work for you, why would I be aware of your company policies? 

·         Did I try to get this service for free?

·         Was there a problem with my payment?

·         So, we agree, the service I got from you and your establishment was poor – right?

At this point, I’m reminded of one of my most favorite movies of all times; The Out-of- Towners with Jack Lemmon.  The thing I like best about that movie is when Jack’s character takes out his pencil and licks the end and adds offenders to his list of folks he intends to report at a later date.

I’m also reminded of my dear brother Phillip (we sure do miss you brother) who had an active list of establishments he just didn’t use anymore due to their lack of good customer service.  What self respecting chicken place doesn’t have chicken?  What self respecting Italian place doesn’t have olive oil.  What self respecting fast food Mexican place doesn’t have ground beef? 

I’m sure you understand Philip’s position and I’ve digressed.  It was my latest encounter with Best Buy that instigated my move to this blog (thanks cousin Lisa for the invite to your blog and this site so I could start my own). 

The Issue

I wanted to make a few purchases for the upcoming holiday.  The hook being a list of things I’ve wanted to gift to some for a time – on sale and no interest rate for 18 months.  For days (you know me), I looked and re-looked at things until I fooled around and the highest price item went off sale and up $30.  Ah but, lo and behold, two other things were on sale and I ended up with a $9 savings overall (smile).

I filled the basket and moved to check out and the screen stopped progressing forward.  I felt a little pressure to complete my transaction, so I called the 1-800 # with high hopes of things going smoothly (come on - I had the numbers for all of the items I wished to purchase – what could go wrong).  I pressed #1 for English (let’s not even go there) and then #4 to get to a human to assist me.  The human was very friendly and appeared to know what she was doing when she asked me to hold while she connected me to sales.    

On the first attempt (you heard me right), I was promptly lost in the dark ibis of “you’re not really connected to anything – remain on hold please,” from which it took me 6 minutes and 31 seconds to figure out I’d been hung up on.  On my second attempt, I made it plain to the friendly human that I needed some assistance and didn’t want to be disconnected or dropped in a go nowhere queue. 

I was quickly connected to a human that indicated she could help me.   I explained my problem and thus began the dance of Toi trying to get good customer service (maybe that was the problem – I should have just tried for service vs. good service). 

After repeating the product items numbers 3 times, repeating the names of all the items in my cart 3 times, fussing over the price of one item, spelling my name 6 times, verifying my email address 4 times, repeating my zip code 7 times, spelling my city out, actually giving her the address of the in-town store & 45 minutes later – I completed my order.  And guess what?  I didn’t blow my stack until the 35 minute mark! 

Some years ago, I heard some advice a lady had gotten from her husband.  It was, “these people are only making $5 an hour so don’t expect but $5 worth of information” (paraphrased).  I try with all my might to keep this in mind. 

I do understand that sometimes the quality of service you get depends on who you get and the type of day they’re having - as I too am in the customer service business.  However, I can’t absorb the lack of pride in doing a job well and the resulting crappy service delivered to ME; especially when I’m paying for the service! 

WHAT THE HECK IS REALLY GOING ON?