Claim Your Space.......

This was a little experience at the fuel station.

I'd done with getting fuel filled, and then moved onto the air pressure checking space. There was already a little queue, and I pulled in behind.

In a couple of minutes I see this guy on an Enfield go past me, and stop ahead in the queue.

I'm at first just wondering how he could do that, then I'm trying to catch his eye and of course, he is looking everywhere except at me. I can feel my annoyance grow.

And then I'm asking myself, 'if you're annoyed, why you just sitting here, why you not doing anything about it... why this quiet submission'. All that walk the talk stuff went through my head, so I get off and very politely I tell him. And this guy has the gall to say, 'no, I'm two wheeler, so I can do it'. I try to reason with him, but to no avail. 

And then he's like, let's ask the air pressure attendant. By then I was mad..so I'm like..'we're two mature adults, why can't we decide' ( what expectations... I was obviously the less mature one there )

Anyways, the issue got resolved by the management quietly stepping in, just seeing this altercation happen, and they set things right.

So one lesson is 'claim your space', just do it politely. Then the next thing which happened, was even more interesting.

We made peace.

All it took was a smile.... no smugness and no I-told-you-so looks....just an honest and open smile......and he picked that up. He gave me a sheepish smile...nevertheless an honest smile.

So the larger take away........ even with difficult situations, keep the ego out and it's possible to end well.