Honey, vinegar, Christmas lights and grocery carts

I believe it was Maya Angelou who said "when people show you who they are - believe them."

One of the first times I realized this was way before I heard it uttered from Ms. Angelou.  I was less that 30 years old.  Jack and I had just moved to a new house.  After a day of settling in, one of the neighbor couples came by to meet us.  Translation - get the info on who we were.  As they sat and visited, the lady in this couple started to tell us about all the other neighbors in the cul-de-sac.  Nothing major - just their names, how many children they had, if any, etc.  When she got to the house in between theirs and ours, she mentioned that they were (we'll just say) Sam and Sue.  She went on to tell me, with pursed lips, that they weren't married.  "We neighbors have tried to convince them to marry, but they just haven't." (Insert her semi-rolled eyes smile here).  I realized in that moment with that statement, she was telling me way more about herself than she was about them.  I have to add that we all became friends while living in that cul-de-sac and she is still the only one that I have contact with.  I guess I found out that she was better than that first impression.  (I checked and she's not on the blog reader list). 

There's currently a Meme in the internet world that says something like this:

"Talking about someone else says more about you than the person you are talking about."

True.  

But, there are other ways for you to show someone who you really are. 
How do you handle tangled Christmas lights?
This will annoy you but, I pack mine away in such a way that they don't get tangled. 
How DO you handle spilled milk?

I can tell a lot about you with just 2 critieria.
1.  How you treat waiters and waitresses?  The checkout people at the store?
2.  Do you return the grocery cart to a cart corral? 

Seriously... those 2 things really, REALLY say a lot about you. 
Put the grocery cart AWAY.  That speaks to the idea of leaving something better or as good as you found it.  Pay it forward.  Someone might have spent years and years of saving for a brand new car.  They don't need a grocery cart ramming into it. 
I understand bad service, but you have no idea what that person may be going through in their life.  It's possible the issues are in the kitchen and not with the wait staff.  Or maybe they were to get off an hour ago and were told to stay and all they can think is how they will be late picking up their kids at daycare.  Which sometimes comes with more of a financial penalty than they will make in that extra forced hour of work.  I get that it's not your job to find out and fix it, so just treat them kindly.  HELL, treat everyone kindly for that same reason. 

Again, I understand that a service person - or anyone can treat you like crap, too.  There's a fine line between taking their crap and putting them in their place.  Be smart enough to do the latter without vulgar language and insults.  Words of encouragement might change them more than anything.  And sometimes, you may just have to walk away - taking the high road. You can't fix stupid, you can't fix their problems in an instant.  So... Move on.
Remember, Grandma said "You can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar."
I suppose we are to understand the analogy in that, but I really find flies annoying.
Sorry, that's counter productive to my point.  Maybe it should say you can garner more sweetness with honey than with vinegar.

What prompted me to think of all this?  The other day I was in a big sports type store.  As I was walking in, they had a box of masks there for people who forgot theirs.  There was a lady simply waiting for her husband to check out - and as they were leaving the store, she helped herself to about 4-5 masks. Again, on the way out of the store, she just helped herself. She didn't appear to me to be someone who couldn't afford her own masks.   

I have no idea who she was, what her name was, or her financial status, or anything else about her statistically.  Such as, I just assumed it was her husband.  It could have been a friend, brother, life partner... ?   I didn't know much about her, but, I knew that I wouldn't want to be her friend.   Unless she worked at a shelter and was going to hand them out to the homeless. But, then if that was the case, just ask the check out person if you can take a few.  I'm sure they would approve and say "sure".  So I suppose without knowing her story, if given the chance for an encounter, I would have just been kind to her. That's the high road.  Oh, and...  They only had one bag to carry out, so they didn't need to take the cart outside. Therefore, I didn't feel the need to follow them out there and assess their character any further.