How do you feel on senior citizen discount Tuesdays at the grocery store when the cashier doesn't ask you?

The older a person is, the more they walk around in pain. People in pain are crabby people. The older a person is, the more "invisible" they are to others, and the more likely they will be ignored.

So they become sensitive to this. The older a person is, the less they suck up to others for approval ... so there is less NEED to be nice just to BE nice. The older a person is, the less power they have over life ... they are often no longer working, often are now on a fixed income.

They have no real future except to watch their friends and family die, to watch their only body slowly detiorate and end in death. This creates a sense of helplessness .. so when some situation ALSO makes them feel helpless, they are more likely to get upset than someone with more of a sense of control would. And in our society, women are still not fully equal to men in many cases .. senior women, in particular, have grown up being second-class citizens with few opportunities, fewer rights, and less power.

Powerless is a risk-factor for women, for children, for the elderly, for minority races and other minority groups. Expect those people to be more affected by real or imagined slights. And expect the older ones to no longer "give a damn" what you think.

SOME of them, at least. I am 66 and I think that the older we get, the more skill we SHOULD have learned about being in control of our emotions, being able to work with them .. especially the emotions aroused by fear, helplessness, and physical pain. And some older people HAVE grown up.

Others just spend their life looking for pleasure wherever they can find it, however it fits into their value system .. they never try to learn to face their inner discomfort and so they never learn how to cope with it. It only gets stronger as we start to age. I am sorry you have to face these people.

But you know ... I have found that younger people no longer give good service. Not compared to what was the standard 40, even just 20 years ago. They don't know, and if they don't know, they don't try to find out.

Often rude and sullen before you have even spoken to them. I have made it a sort of goal to try to see if I can perk them up and get them to smile (and have gained some skill at doing this). Many of them don't know their job well and don't care .. not about the job, not about the customer either.

Some of them can't even make change unless the cash register tells them how much change to give back. I can see why older people are so impatient with the rudeness they receive from "customer service" personnel. It is a two-way street you know.

If I am crabby with you, it makes it harder for you to treat others kindly. And if you are crabby with me, it makes it harder for me to treat others kindly.

I will say that there is no reason for anyone to be rude. But as an older person I have a ton of aches and pains. I really get ticked when I'm checking out and the lines are long or I have to go through checking myself out and put this here and then put it all back.

I want to be checked out. And then here the stores have a habit of putting out markdowns on items and when you check out it gives you the regular price and then you have to stand there until someone comes over and then walks back in the store to make sure you aren't a liar. That makes me rude and I can be exceptionally rude.

I know it isn't the person that is checking me out that is at fault and it is the store policy and you all have to do as you are told. Let the buyer beware makes me upset. Deal with it.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.