Vendors are People

I worked for a long time in the corporate world. Then took voluntary retirement. It has been more than eight years and I am seeing myself change bit by bit in miniscule ways. I like the new me.It is a shade different from the old me, and I welcome the new shade.
It is like this. I used to be really busy managing home, kids and office. The vegetable vendor used to be a service provider for me. I used to relate to him so. I would just peep outside, look at the stuff on his cart and quickly order the stuff I want. He would interject with some suggestions and I would feel it is an unnecessary intrusion.Transaction over, he delivers the stuff and I hand over the money.

Now the scenario is different. The same vegetable vendor is doing the rounds now. Last few days he has not come. His wife and son who has given his school final exams are there with the cart.I am interested enough to ask them his whereabouts. The wife says, husband is not well and has diabetes and the harsh summer does not agree with him. So she picks up vegetables from a nearby shop(she cannot go to koyambedu early in the morning) and delivers it in the cart. I felt very bad, so ended up  buying a little more than what I needed.

Last few days I have become a customer of  a vegetable vendor who comes in the evenings. It is the end of the day stuff, so not really appetising. I never patronised him in the past. But now I see him, I feel he needs to sell all that he had bought in the morning, otherwise it will be a loss for him. So I end up ordering for some keerai and some sapota.He agrees to deliver it at home, as I am on my way to amma's house at that time.

I went to a upmarket vegetable shop in the neighbourhood and bought vadu maangai as it was glistening and tempting. I have never made vadu mangai till now. But I bought a kilo of the stuff. The very next day, my evening vendor asked me that I have not bought anything last two days. I said I have stuff at home. He said buy vadu mangai. I found myself not able to say no and move on. I said yes and a bit old, a bit stale and not so good one kilo of vadu mangai is sitting in my fridge. S and me talked about it and decided that the not so good ones, we can cut them into small pieces and make fresh mango pickle(the way it is done in weddings). The joke is none of us eat pickle.So you see, where I have landed myself?

I used to be fascinated with amma having a roaring personal equation and interest in every vendor. When we chat, invariably some anecdote about a vendor would crop up. So much so I used to tell her that they are your fourth and fifth kids, by the amount of interest you take in them. I am able to see that I am getting there. The vendors are becoming actual people and I am able to see them as such. They are not cogs in the wheel of managing a house.

They have now an integral part of my eco sysem. It also answers a question that used to plague my friends in the office. We do pay the maids more than some of the ladies who are managing the houses but the maids dont stick around much. I now understand that the ladies who used to manage homes full time, had time and used to treat them as people. Whereas we did not have the time and we had unknowingly commoditised them.

I have become a softie. I like the new me.