One week behind a counter and you’ll never look at a cashier the same way again.

Service work puts you on the other side of a transaction you have been on one side of your whole life, and it is hard to unlearn. You find out that the person at the register is handling a queue, a till, a manager and their own tiredness while you decide between two sizes. Sympathy stops being a principle and becomes a memory.

You do not need the job to get some of this. Watch whoever serves you once this week and notice what they are juggling. Use their name if they are wearing one, and be the easy customer in a line full of difficult ones.