#2 Have A Nice Day

"Have a nice day," Neil said as he handed the $3.50 in change to the driver. A woman in her mid-thirties driving a 1998 Blue Ford Taurus had stopped one foot too far forward to easily make the exchange of toll money. When her elbow failed to hyper extend itself and she could no longer bear the tension, her hand and forearm shot forward. She squeezed the ones but dropped the two quarters.

Neil saw the coins tumble. Heard them hit the asphalt and bounce. He locked eyes with her for a few seconds. "She must be having a real crappy day," Neil thought. She looked like she might start crying right there in the toll booth lane. "Golly, all on account of dropping fifty cents," he thought.

'Remember, Neil," he said to himself, "You can't guess what every poor fool coming through your toll lane is runnin' towards or runnin' from. So you can't judge 'em. Not ever, unless they mean to harm you. Then that's pretty clear."

That advice passed from Neil's training supervisor thirty-two years ago when he first took on the job of toll booth operator. For thirty-two years that advice never fled his mind. It had stuck and he was happy for it. He had absorbed more than his share of rude and obnoxious people in his time in the booth. But because of the advice he could let it go and just focus on the next car. Comfort resided in that release for Neil.

Now there was another rule of equal importance that Neil didn't remember so well. From time to time he broke this rule and to date, it had not come to any consequence. Until today.

"Neil, no matter what happens, don't leave your booth and walk into the toll lane. The lane is for cars and cops, not toll-takers." His supervisor leaned in close like he meant to pick a fight with the young trainee. "You hear me, Neil? Never leave the booth and get in that lane."

"Don't move, ma'am," Neil said. "I'll get your quarters for you."

Neil turned away from his window, grabbed a flashlight and opened a door on the opposite side of the booth. He made the tight right hand turns needed to go around the front of the booth and into the lane. He stood in front of the woman's car and fanned the flashlight's beam across the ground where he suspected the coins might lie. When he couldn't see them he got down on his knees and looked underneath the car.

The shift supervisor at the Benson P. Meadowbrook toll station looked out the wide-paned glass of her office just in time to see her Neil, her graying, stoop-shouldered, big-hearted Neil going to his knees in front of the blazing headlights of an idling car. She jumped up out of her chair, touched both hands to the glass but couldn't speak or move any further.

Neil's squinty eyes opened wide when simultaneously, he both found the quarters and heard the engine rev and roar.