Dear foul-mouthed woman shouting into your cell phone in the Charlottesville Michael’s Craft Store in the framing department at 3:30 p.m. on Tuesday, October 9,
Here is what I wish I could have said to you yesterday; however, I restrained myself because I didn’t want to interrupt your conversation, as that would have been rude:
1. Talking loudly on a cell phone in a store is rude and obnoxious.
2. Talking loudly about politics on a cell phone in a store is rude and obnoxious.
3. Talking loudly and using foul language about politics on a cell phone in a store is rude and obnoxious.
I understand that you are tired of the current ongoing and never-ending presidential election. Really, I feel your pain. I personally cannot wait for Wednesday, November 7, either.
However…
Going off on a loud, crude political diatribe using the F-bomb in a public place is annoying and offensive. Luckily, no small children were nearby to hear you say, “Pardon my French, but…”
Furthermore, you totally lost all credibility when you also declared to the poor person on the receiving end of your call (your mother, I believe) that you’ve “never registered to vote and never will.” You looked to be in your mid-to-late 40s, which means you’ve had numerous opportunities to become a fully engaged citizen for more than 20 years, yet you have chosen not to use your Constitutional right to do so — a right, I might add, that earlier generations of women fought and died for. For their suffering alone, it behooves you to get yourself to the Registrar of Voters’ office.
Your rationale that you hate both candidates equally is a poor one, especially since you say you’ve never voted. What? You’ve hated both candidates every time there’s been an election in the past 20+ years? That’s a lot of haterade you’re drinking.
I suspect the larger issue is that either you are lazy or you don’t understand the importance of your vote or both. What a shame. Virginia is going to be a key part of the 2012 election and those of us who do our civic duty and vote could very well decide which man lives in the White House for the next four years.
While there are usually other candidate options in every election, I can understand your reluctance to throw away your vote (you know, the one you’ve never actually cast) on someone who’s not a Democrat or Republican. I suggest that you educate yourself. From what you were saying, I seriously doubt you have actually researched either President Obama’s or Mr. Romney’s platforms. Go to their websites. Read what they have to say. Find one candidate that you dislike less than the other and vote for him. Then, trust that he will do the very best job than he can do.
I also recommend that you read this book, as it will give you some seriously eye-opening insights into one of the toughest jobs in the world.
Until you have actually exercised your right to vote, you have no reasonable foundation for bitching about this country’s leadership.
Peace,
Jen
P.S. Time is running out. If you live in the city, the voter registration office is conveniently located in City Hall on the Downtown Mall. If you live in the county, you need to go to the county offices on 5th Street. Or, you can look online and download the necessary forms.
P.P.S. Also, if I ever hear you again anywhere, I won’t hesitate to tell you all this.
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Good for you. What a waste of a voting-age citizen. What is our country coming to? I also seethe whenever adults/teens drop foul language indiscriminately into conversations that children can hear.
I cannot say enough how much I HATE cell phones. I’m all for banning them in public places, similar to smoking. If you really need to make a call, then let’s keep everyone in one spot where they can’t bother the rest of us with their rudeness and oversharing.
And you can’t bitch if you can’t vote. Period.
Don’t vote, not can’t vote. Need more coffee…
My husband is running for office. I have been helping him campaign. We get voter lists with some demographic information. We only pull the data for people who have voted in at least one of the past three elections.
That means I only go to maybe every other or every third house. Because those people HAVE NOT VOTED. I am so tempted to knock on their door and tell them what losers they are. Don’t they understand how lucky we are to live in a country where it is assumed that the people choose the government and that the government works for us?
Wow, that’s one conversation that probably should have been interrupted. It must have taken quite a bit of will power to restrain yourself.
They’ve re-districted here, and I had to work pretty hard to figure out where my new polling place is. Really, they should send out an announcement through the mail, I think.
Also, I’m SO with Becky on cell phones. I do own one now, but it would NEVER occur to me to have a conversation where other people can hear me. And even worse are those conversations over the dorky blue-tooth ear thingy. I really don’t want to overhear anyone’s conversations. I mean think about it –public phones were put in phone booths so people could have some privacy! Why are people even comfortable having their private conversations in public?!
I can’t stand non-voters. Even polite ones.
I have loved voting since my dad let me turn the levers for him (with me saying loudly “the YES one?” for the entire middle school gym to hear). I don’t understand not going to the polls.
so, you didn’t just run your cart up the back of her heels then?
LOL! And then in way of apology, ask her to guess which candidate you are voting for!
heh @ Green Girl….;)
My auto reaction to my cell ringing? either ignore, and check later for voicemail, or, if I know someone is calling me that I REALLY need to talk to at that particular moment (like a kid, oy) I walk very fast, purposefully, either outside, or to a very secluded spot. Wherever I am. It doesn’t matter where. But, I look at answering my ringing cell, as a very private thing to do. Almost like undressing in the evening, and putting on my jammies.
I honestly don’t know how this mindset of mine came about. I like to believe it came Wish this was the norm.
whoa, half my comment got cut off up there above! sheesh.
I just do not understand NOT VOTING! People died for this right. Died. Gave their lives for people that live on this soil to vote. For women. For blacks. To escape their country where voting wasn’t an option. To have the right to get to vote in their own country because they want to be free like we are. And what do we do? Bitch about everything to anyone that will listen and not really give a damn and then not do any damn thing at all.
My husband and I do not understand the people in our own families who don’t vote who have heard the stories of the Civil Rights pioneers and/or who are proud of our own family members who have proudly served – and then won’t get off their own lazy asses one day a year for less than an hour and use the one voice you truly do have to make a difference. If you live in Virginia or Pennsylvania, or Florida or Ohio, or Colorado, or or or MOVE YOU BODY TO THE VOTING BOOTH! Get educated and GO VOTE.
Jen,
I greatly appreciate how well you have written your letter. There is nothing political, only something American – the right to vote. I seriously doubt that many people fall completely to one side or the other these days. I find myself usually somewhere in the middle. That is the blessing that comes along with keeping yourself informed, not just on candidates, but on the law, employement, economics, etc. – you are able to form your own opinions without having to subscribe 100% to what is available on one side or the other. I have discussions with my teens often about how you can not complain about something but then choose to standby and do nothing. “Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do” – John Wooden. This is one of my favorite quotes. I cannot solve all of the problems that I see in the world, in our country or in my own neighborhood. That is no reason not to do the things that I can do. Voting is a very important thing that we are privileged to be able to do.
Thanks again for this well written letter Jen.
Ginger
1) I cannot fathom why anyone would fail to cast a vote in a major election (local, state, or federal). It’s not as if the person can claim he or she didn’t KNOW there was an election! And I live in a county where they make it so very EASY — they mail the ballots and voter information pamphlets to all registered voters!
2) I would consider carrying duct tape and using it on mouths that spew filthy language, but it would probably end in my getting assault charges brought against me.
3) I’m guilty of answering my cell phone in a public place such as the craft store or Target, but the conversation will be purposeful (getting the Christmas wish list from my SIL for her kids — hello, Target!) and/or very brief, because I can’t run errands and talk on the phone at the same time.
4) If you didn’t vote, you didn’t earn the right to complain. The way to change things is to vote!
Hear hear!!
I admit to voter apathy for only one Presidential election, and that was the ’76 election. I was born just two weeks too late to vote in the ’72 election and by the time the ’76 election came along I was living without a TV and barely read the news. By the ’80 election, I had become politically engaged and have been ever since – often to my despair.
For anyone who thinks their vote doesn’t count in the national races, look around your own community and get engaged in your local races, where you can really see an effect.
Am I the only person in the world who isn’t offended by public cell phone conversations? It’s one thing if you’re making people wait while you carry on a conversation–that’s rude–but someone who’s just minding their own business and talking into a phone doesn’t bother me at all.
Michaels.
I feel sorry for her mother…
Interesting point. Based on what I heard, the mother was completely clueless that there was a presidential debate last week, which makes me wonder what else she is unaware of.
Completely agree – might have to print this out to hand off to the next person I run into who spouts off about not voting.
I usually do speak up to the foul mouthed ones, though.
I always tell my kids to vote, whether or not they like the options, it’s a right others have died to give them. Honor the dead if nothing else.
Dear People at my Michael’s on Sunday evening: thanks for being so nice when I freaked out and couldn’t find my purse, quite sure for a moment I left it languishing in some random aisle. I’m quite sure I said something inappropriate. Thanks for letting me use my phone to call my mom and confirm I’m an idiot who left it sitting in the car with her. And for waiting while she delivered it to me even though I offered to go to the back of the line for being such an idiot. *sigh* It’s been a rough week.
Also: I am so so so so so tired of politics. Why does it turn so many people so unbelievably ugly?
Points well taken.
I thought I’d made it clear that we are avoiding the framing department at Michael’s.