A Little Perspective

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Can I help you with anything else?

That, my friends, is a very dangerous question. Let me tell you why... So, as many of you know, my Monday nights are currently dominated by my second job at Deseret Book. I don't complain though as the perks of discounts and some extra income outweigh the negatives. However, this week provided one of the best encounters yet. As usual, I was minding my own business putting away newly arrived books when a male customer in a red shirt entered the store and immediately made eye contact with me. Since retail experience has trained me to be pro-active, I dutifully walked up and asked if I could help him find something. He responded he was looking for a DVD, so I led him to the movie section and quickly helped him find the correct one. As I was about to leave him to browsing, I asked as an after-thought, "Can I help you with anything else?" Bad move. The moment it left my lips I knew this was going to go somewhere I didn't want it to. He looked at me thoughtfully for half a second, cocked his head, and said "Yeah actually, maybe I could take you out for dinner or something sometime?" YIKES! Now let me just preface this boys with a word to the wise: Asking a girl out who you have only met 2 minutes prior is NOT socially appropriate. Ever. I don't care if you're the smoothest most attractive operator around, it's just not a good idea. So, this being my philosophy, I wasn't about to cave out of pity. After an awkward moment of silence I smiled, said I was flattered, but no. Truth be told, I felt pretty guilty (not to mention uncomfortable), but I would rather be honest than misleading. So he wished me a good day and made a quick exit to the register. Now if the story ended here, it would be sad enough, but it doesn't. About 15 minutes later I made my way up to the registers to look up something on the computer and had my cute co-worker Amy give me a look and say quietly as she rang up a customer "Oh I have a story for you" to which my eyes widened and I replied "Oh-ho I'm sure you do, as I have the same one." Turns out literally minutes after getting shot down by me, the man had approached her and done the same thing. The difference was, she is a nicer person than I am and ended up giving her number to him even though she had no desire whatsoever of going on a date with him. So, props to you red shirt man...I don't think I would ever have the nerve to ask out someone who I don't even know, and then straight out the gate of being denied, go and repeat the process 5 minutes later. At least he had a 50% success rate though, right? Oh Provo.

4 Comments:

Blogger Sara said...

I wish I could like this post lol... you should have gone out with him man... who knows :)

October 22, 2012 at 12:20 AM  
Blogger Stefanie Hathaway said...

Elyse!!! You have got to give people a chance! Shoot... free dinner? SAY YES!!!!!!!!

October 22, 2012 at 8:22 AM  
Blogger Michelle Glauser said...

No! You never have an obligation to go out when you don't want to. Just because we're trained to bend over backwards for anyone doesn't mean we should. I think you did the right thing, and I think the other girl is in for some awkward interactions just because she didn't want to hurt someone's feelings.

October 22, 2012 at 9:03 AM  
Blogger Elyse Marie said...

Thanks for backing me up Michelle lol. I'm just not a glutton for self punishment. I've been on enough awkward and painful dates to back up my philosophy on this point.

October 23, 2012 at 1:37 AM  

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