In these days of text messaging and multi-tasking, is anyone listening?

I called the wait-forever-for-someone-to-come-on-the-line number to make an appointment with my doctor. Finally the music stopped and a human asked what he could do for me. I said I wanted to make an appointment with my doctor and he asked what for and I told him I wanted to talk to her about the results of my bone scan.

“You say you want the results of your bone scan?”

“No. I have the results. I want to talk to my doctor about them.”

“You should be able to get them at the lab. Call the lab.”

Silent scream. “I got the results from the lab. I want an appointment with my doctor.”

“When did you have this done?” Huge urge to shout, but calmly with clenched teeth, I told him, “Last Friday.”

“Oh. Last Friday? Are you sure?”

“Yes. Last Friday.”

“Would you happen to remember if that would have been this year or last year?”

SCREAM!

I didn’t scream but boy did I want to. I couldn’t believe my ears. Actually, it was kind’a funny and if I’d thought fast I should’ve told him it was five years ago. Not that he would have noticed.

Nothing was resolved when I hung up except that he said he’d have my doctor’s office call me.

Today an investment broker called and asked me how to spell my first name so he could put me on the list of people who would be meeting next Wednesday.

I told him it started with “she” as in “she” and then I spelled that out, in case he didn’t get it because he wasn’t sounding much like he understood. Slowly and clearly I spelled out “s” “h” “e.” Gave him a minute to get that down and continued: “i” “l” “a.” He repeated it back. “S” “h” “e” “l”

This time I did – almost. Laugh. I stifled it, though, just in time. Here was a broker, dealing with probably but hopefully not, millions of dollars for his clients and he couldn’t get the first four letters right. Good thing those stock symbols are only three letters – or less.

Is it happening to you, too? Nobody’s listening any more. Like the day I called the bank because they’d charged my online banking fee to an account I’d just closed. I was going to tell them to charge it to another – open – account, but I never got a chance! Soon as I mentioned the charge, the banker right away started explaining what the charge was and why it was so high and how I could reduce it by changing my account setup. She never did let me tell her to transfer the charge to the other account.

Maybe everyone’s multi-tasking: texting on their phones and sending e-mails on their BlackBerries and signaling the kids to be quiet while they’re listening. Or maybe they just know it all already and never need to listen to anyone.

Okay. I do it, too. Sometimes. And you probably do, too. But… Gee, if I didn’t hear what you said, I’d say so. Like, “What did you just say? Sorry. I wasn’t paying attention. I was thinking about what Hilary’s going to do next.”

My doctor’s office called today. They said they would try to get my test results, but when I explained I already had them and just wanted an appointment, the lady – who was a great listener, by the way – said that was totally not what the appointment guy told them and she promptly scheduled me for next Thursday and we were done.

Her cell phone must not have had texting capabilities ’cause she was definitely paying attention.

©Sheila Buska 2008

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