As an offshoot of Retirement Home activities we will be offering courses in patience here this summer. The first session will be a test of your patience before you start the course. In step 1 we will ask you to take the elevator to the 9th floor and return to ground level.
Your trip will go something like this: You will wait at ground floor level watching the indicator lights stopping at every floor. The elevator will finally arrive and the doors will open. Inside will be 3 ladies; one with a stick, one with a caregiver and one with a walker. They will all inspect you closely and then one will announce that they are going down, the other two will argue while holding the door open and tell you that they are going up. You get in and down you go. At the lower floor level, 3 more people will get in. There will be another argument and two caregivers say they will catch the next car because this one is full. Then everyone in the elevator presses buttons and the elevator takes off and stops at every floor. The same thing happens on the way down.
Your smiling patience coach will rescue you at the ground floor and tell you that you passed the first stage of the test. Your second task is to get a cup of coffee from the coffee machine. You will stand behind a 95 year old woman who is serving herself a cup of coffee from a vending machine. She has a built-in shake and no saucer, hence the little pool of coffee on the floor. You offer to help her and you reach forward to take the cup. She puts the cup down on the counter, turns round to face you, puts her hands on her hips and snarls, “I don’t need any help, thank you!” She turns back and starts the coffee spilling process again.
End of patience lesson No. 1
