Patience: apparently I have it.

Of the numerous adjectives in the languages of the world, patient isn't one of the first ones I would think of to describe myself.  I'm working on it though.  Perhaps the best practice in being patient, for me, is talking to people at call centers, because I find it to be the easiest thing in the world to be patient with them.

Yesterday, I wrote about how I've been helping one of the producers I work for with all of her computer problems.  Unfortunately, I couldn't figure out all of those problems myself, so I've also been spending a LOT of time on the phone with AppleCare.

Now, the woman I'm doing all this for (self-admittedly) is not very patient with things like call-in help centers.  She's always amazed at how lighthearted I am about calling Apple over and over....and over and over and over.  I've probably spent a good 9 or 10 hours on the phone with them in the past few weeks combined (and I only work with this woman one day a week).  It actually inspired me to write a script about a girl who's only human interactions are with operators at help centers.

I kind of enjoy it though...talking to people at call centers.  As I said in my post about strangers, I like to be the politest and friendliest I can be with strangers, particularly people at call centers, because I don't even want to think about how many indignant, frustrated, angry, and altogether awful people must call those centers everyday.  I hope to be a breath of fresh air for the operators who do nothing but talk to rude people all day.  Plus, it's really fun to talk to them, because I can say whatever I want-- it's not like I'll ever meet them (or talk to them again).  This past Tuesday I started talking to an operator about the difference in the weather between Oregon and California (high desert vs. low desert- it was snowing in Oregon at the time).

I'm also (incredibly) able to laugh off all of the computer problems that I've been having to call Apple about-- something that amazes the woman I'm working for.  Somehow, I'm able to see and embrace the irony of the situation with her computer (she upgraded it to make it work better and now it's much worse).  I try to think of it as a scene from a movie or something like that-- how funny it would be to watch someone else go through what I'm going through-- and it works pretty well.  I don't know how this specific situation is so easy for me to handle.

The woman I work for told her husband (who admits that he is also pretty impatient) about how giggly I was about the whole computer fiasco, and how impressive it was.  Of course, her husband, being a very sarcastic person, said, "yeah, but Tess is the one we'll see walking into The Grove with a gun 6 months from now." (The Grove is an outdoor shopping center in LA that's kind of like Disney World in that it's synthetically pretty and it's full of music and tourists.)

So I guess patience is a virtue...and also a sign of buried mental instability.  Well...I hope that's not my case.