on David Sedaris and unfixable problems

(a short rantifesto)

I once listened to an interview with the American humour writer David Sedaris in which he mused about his tendency to get ratty with customer service phone reps. The curious thing, Sedaris noticed, was that he didn’t just become mildly irritable after being put on hold then transferred from this department (which is normal) but violently, murderously enraged. Being David Sedaris, he considered this weird tendency at length and ultimately decided the reason for his disproportionate emotional response was that some part of him felt degraded by the process itself. His feeling wasn’t just, This is boring (which would be normal) but rather one of: Surely I’m above this shit? Do these idiots even know who I am?

Reader: I felt seen.

Now every time I find myself talking to some relentlessly-friendly Scottish Apple Cares bloke or an anxious Philippines call centre employee on a zero-hours, zero-pay contract and I feel the familiar molten lava bubbling up in my breast I think of David Sedaris. Not his superiority or anger but the fact that even he — David freaking Sedaris! — has to regularly sit on hold for forty-five minutes only to be told he’s been locked out of the system for a week after three failed password attempts.