About Maturity

The other day, I’m at the checkout stand in the supermarket when my young cashier sees her obvious crush and everything else was shot into teenage romance zone. She becomes totally oblivious to the clearly mundane task of ringing up my groceries. “Why you didn’t text me?” she stage hollers (I guess her supervisors must have some rules as to what is appropriate behavior in front of customers). I stop trying to organize my youngest’s unloading of food from inside the trolley and look up, she’s caught my attention.

From his hiding place behind the potato chips display, I spot her object d’amour - a young man dressed in a soda delivery uniform. I must note here, how unused to this type of scenario I am. You see I cannot help but observe that in Jamaica (which a third world economy), jobs such as this are almost never held by teenagers; instead adults with families hold such coveted service industry positions as jobs are hard to get and any money coming in is better than no money at all – same are a step up from household helpers and gardeners which are perhaps the most basic level for the unskilled labor industry and a very menial way to eke out a living. In other words, it is a successful economy that can afford to place youth in what could be sort after positions for breadwinners in purportedly lesser, cash strapped financial systems but sometimes the young do not know how to honor such privileges – just an observation - but I digress, back to the show.

So my girl races through checking out the items I purchased, hurriedly grabs my money, shoves the change in my hand, packs meat in with tinned goods and abandons her post to bumrush the poor guy. But wait, I was in the way, still packing up what she had deemed unnecessary to stuff into a bag. She practically impaled me against the checkout aisle with the cart while sending my child lurching as she wiggled up the narrow space, hot pursuit was where her focus remained fixed, everything else mere projectiles to be dispersed at will. Forget the job responsibilities!!

Even with all her abrasive behavior, the mother instinct in me wanted to caution her and share wisdom gained through years of experience. I wished she could just look at the little guy cowering behind the snacks through my eyes – her enthusiasm was scaring him – me too for that matter! Alas I shook my head, checked my disoriented daughter for injury and quickly left the immediate area before she came trampling back to her station. Glancing over my shoulder as I departed, I could see her interrogating the poor young man while gesticulating wildly and causing a scene, tsk, tsk, I thought. It wouldn’t happen if an adult had in her space. There’s something to be said about maturity or decorum for that matter, which is best gained with age.