reverse threading

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Tag Archives: on hold


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your estimated wait time. [kerri’s blog on saturday morning smack-dab.]

it’s a true story. 

so yesterday, in an effort to save the social-security-signing-up-for-medicare office some time, i tried to cancel an appointment with them. i had already accomplished what i needed online and i wanted them to be able to satisfy another customer’s needs. 

i looked all over on their site for a way to cancel this appointment. nothing. nowhere to cancel. 

but on the letter (which i received in real life as well as online) there was a phone number. 

thinking that there would be an “option” to choose to cancel appointments, i dialed up.

nope. no option for canceling.

just an option for appointments.

“one hour and fifty minutes,” the pleasantly-recorded bad news said.

i started to stay on hold. put my phone on speaker and laid it next to me. 

but i have other things to do. and an hour and fifty minutes to sit on hold in an effort to cancel a phone appointment with them is a tad bit – well – ridiculous. i was just trying to be nice, responsible, aware…you know, all those adjectives about being a good customer, a good citizen, a good fellow-almost-medicare person who knows that other people have questions too and these departments are overrun and that it took me two full months to get this appointment and i would like someone else to be the happy recipient of it.

whatever.

i hung up.

today, when they call, i’ll suggest that they find a way to make it easier to cancel an appointment.

because – doggonit – i’m almost 65 and my time is worth something too.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this SATURDAY MORNING

SMACK-DAB. ©️ 2024 kerrianddavid.com

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on hold… [saturday morning smack-dab.]

quiet guitar, a little flute, an oboe line weaving in and out.

i know – without a doubt – that they are trying to keep me calm while on hold. having just gotten off the phone with a billing department, it is not a far reach for me to imagine one falling fast asleep during this interminable period of time. the age of technology and customer service have taken a turn to the worse if they are programming music specifically to slow down our rapidly-beating hearts and blood pressure when we call.

from a personal standpoint, were i to be accessing this music – this particular track – through a mindful practice app or a guided imagery site, it would be pretty helpful. but the use of background music on loop – a composer’s nightmare – to soothe my billingbrain is trying.

and then there was this moment i had on hold one day when i called an insurance company. paperwork strewn in front of me, pencil and notebook at the ready, a list of questions in my head, i was ready to take them on. i was instantly put on hold the moment i selected “speak to a representative”.

the music started.

mine.

piano, strings, a cello line weaving in and out…

it did take my mind off the insurance debacle.

instead, i just kept wondering if they were paying royalties.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this SATURDAY MORNING

SMACK-DAB. ©️ 2023 kerrianddavid.com


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the fermata. [k.s. friday]

on hold.

the fermata lingers over my days, issuing a pause of length undetermined. the baton is held in the air. there is no downbeat, no pattern of time. just prolonged waiting.

in dr. seuss fashion we wait in the waiting place.

answers are just beyond our grasp, skimming the rim of the atmosphere, invisible to us, ephemeral and flimsy, ever-changing, like trying to capture the flicker of flame from the top of a candle lit in the darkness.

so i just keep waiting. we just keep waiting. our world just keeps waiting.

we sit quietly. we rail at the wind. we speak up. we skirt to the sidelines. we ask questions. we wonder. we are met with silence. we are dissolved. we seek fairness, equity. there is none of that. we step away from the noise. it follows us, snapping at our ankles. we do good work. we seek truth. we are managed, a place of hypocrisy. our country flails. we flail.

and we wait. knowing that, indeed, better will come. knowing that, in some measures, new will come. knowing that, after the fermata, light will come. grieving all we have lost in the process, in the journey, in the waiting place.

we are holding.

read DAVID’s thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY

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