Apparently, I’m not very good at communicating.

I took my daughter to an appointment recently. The front desk got busy as I was checking in, but I asked to pay my copay because I am sick of showing up to an appointment one week and having the bill arrive the next week and then I gotta dig up a stamp and a check and mail the thing–just to go back the next week and start all over. End the cycle already, I say.

“I would like to pay my copay now, please.”

“OK.” She took my $20 bill. Then proceeded to help the lady behind me.

“Um–”

“Oh just a minute. Let me help this lady.”

And in my mind, I was like… “How does she not realize I was here first?” So I just stood there, mouth agape.

She gave me a stern look, like a librarian shushing you with her evil eye.

Like I had done something wrong.

I raised my eyebrows. Like, I just could not think of words. Words left me. All my words were gone. I just stood there, feeling like the World’s Worst Communicator.

“You can sit down. I’ll get you a receipt in a minute.”

I sat down. My daughter was called back. I left to go get a sandwich.

I know that sounds totally ridiculous. Who would be thinking about food at a time like this? But maybe the reason I couldn’t talk was because I was hungry. I don’t know. I was just so hungry I could not think straight.

As I returned, it occurred to me that I really needed the receipt because the receptionist might just not process my payment. I could see her forgetting all about me and finding my $20 on her desk at the end of the day and wondering where it came from and just taking it home.

So I went back up to the desk.

Blank stare. Doe eyes.

I started to explain, but she cut me off: “Do you have an appointment?”

OK, in all fairness I was gone for 43 minutes. Enough time to forget my face. It is a forgettable face. I get it.

“No, I do not have an appointment. I wanted to get my receipt for the payment I just made.”

Blank stare.

“About 45 minutes ago.”

Still not seeming to register what I was talking about, she asked me all kinds of questions like what the payment was for, how much it was, the name on the account. She looked like she was pretending to concentrate, trying to remember something about a receipt. Out of desperation, she finally started shuffling through papers on her desk, like she was trying to buy time while she thought of something to tell me.

“Oh!” she suddenly shouted, sounding genuinely surprised as she picked up a paper with my daughter’s name on it. “Here it is.” At this point, she was pretending like she had known all along about the receipt and was only trying to remember where it was, not WHAT it was.

Whatever.

I took the receipt.

It showed a $40 credit on my account.

All that trouble, and I did not even owe them money.

And that was the moment I knew… 

1. I am not very good at communicating.
2. I should just make my payments by mail from now on. 

Also, note to self: I do not owe a copay for the next appointment.