Do you see people or do you see workers?

Tags

employees, Germany, Gilmore Girls, help, host family, maids, money, Single in Suburbia, Starbucks, study abroad, wealth, Wendy Wax

You enter your favorite book store, coffee shop, or restaurant and someone rings you up.  Are you talking on your cell phone?  Do you ask them how their day was?  Do you see a person standing before you or do you see a worker bee sent from the cosmos to wait on you?  Our tendency is to look down on those serving us, but one thing I picked up from my host family in Germany is that every job is important, therefore every person who performs a job is important.  Imagine if all of the janitorial staff vanished overnight.  Sometimes we don’t appreciate what we have.

Thankfully, society seems to agree with my host family.  People who disregard the help are seen as snobby rather than admired.  Take these examples from the TV show Gilmore Girls and novel Single in Suburbia…