Bits And Pieces

This Business of Waiting

     Do you get fidgety and short tempered when you're forced to wait?  Well actually as housewives we spend a good portion of every day just waiting--and therefore we should be the most patient of folks as we've had enough practice.

     Take just a plain ordinary summer day.  We spend a share of the morning waiting for the kids to wake up so's we can get the kitchen cleaned and breakfast dishes out of the way.  Often we have to spend the day waiting for the delivery man or a service call for one of the ailing household appliances.

     If we do manage to escape to the store for a bit of shopping, we wait in the checkout lines.  We wait for that woman ahead of us to unload her cart and fidget while she goes back for a forgotten item and then writes a check for the whole business--so we wait while her signature is verified and her number okayed.

     We need shoes for the youngsters or a pair for ourselves; do we walk in to be waiting on immediately?  Not these days we don't.  We take a number from a hook and wait our turn.

     At the meat market or bakery we take a number, glance hopefully at the number now being served and settle down for many minutes of waiting as we watch the piece of meat we've selected or the cake we've decided upon being bought by the woman ahead.

     An appointment at the doctors or dentists means little these days.  Even though we arrive with time to spare the office is full and an appointment merely means we're to come on that day and have a certain hour reserved for ourselves to sit and wait.

     In fact we housewives have grown so accustomed to waiting we allow extra time for our shopping and appointments merely because we know we'll have to wait some place along the daily line.

     "I've an appointment with the doctor at two this afternoon."  You inform the children before they head to school in the morning.  "Now I should be home but I'll probably have to wait, so come in and change your clothes."  So you see you're not really disappointed when you have to spend time waiting for appointments.

     Most eating places take it for granted that you're willing to wait a few minutes for a table and there's even a constant lineup to see a new movie.

     Did you ever get in the lineup t the hospital cast clinic?  Here you wait and fidget while the stream of people ahead of you on crutches or arm in a sling take their turn.

     I take a book along to any appointment I have and actually get additional chapters read while I wait.

     We mothers become so accustomed to waiting that we easily accept the "just a minute" good-naturedly when the youngsters are slow at doing our request.

     In fact we reason if we don't have to wait in a restaurant for a table the food can't be any good.  Or if the doctor's office is empty we've doubts about this professional man's ability.

     Men are more impatient than women.  They keep business appointments punctually nd are more reluctant to eat at restaurants where the line is long---They're the ones who fidget and sigh when faced to resign themselves to waiting in a doctor or dentist's office.

     But after all, we women have had more experience at this waiting game.  We wait at hairdressers, wait for the children at school on a rainy day, wait at dancing and music lessons.  Pickup, tote, and wait.  But then we're better conditioned from the start--didn't we wait nine months for a baby?

I have yet to find this article published to verify the date written could have been anytime as she was a freelancer.  This could have been just between her and the typewriter too.