A Montreal emergency room and a McDonald’s during the dinner rush have more in common than they should.
I learned this years apart.
The first time was late at night in the emergency room of a Montreal hospital.
The name doesn’t matter.
If you’ve ever spent a night in a Montreal ER, you already know the main activity.
Waiting.
We were there with a broken arm. Or a suspected fracture. I don’t remember the medical details anymore.
I remember the queue.
An hour passed.
Then another.
Eventually you reach the stage where checking the time becomes pointless because the time has clearly stopped caring about you.
Around us were people with completely different problems. Someone was holding his stomach. Someone was asleep across two chairs. Someone else kept getting up to ask the desk how much longer it would be.
On the wall was the usual notice about respecting staff.
No abuse. No threats. No aggressive behaviour.
Reasonable enough.
A young guy was sitting near me. I think he had injured or broken a finger.
He was remarkably quiet.
At some point we started talking, and I asked how long he had been there.
A long time.
Apparently he hadn’t always been this quiet.
Earlier, he told me, he had complained about the wait. Asked why nothing was happening. Pushed a little harder than the staff appreciated.
According to him, the message he got back was basically this:
keep it up and security will be called, and you’ll be escorted out.
After that, he stopped complaining.
He sat quietly.
Very quietly.
I remembered him years later in a McDonald’s.
This time I wasn’t a patient.
I was a delivery driver.
Dinner rush.
Several drivers were standing by the counter, each holding a phone with an order number on the screen.
One waited quietly.
Another leaned toward the counter every thirty seconds.
A third had reached the bargaining stage.
“Is my order ready?”
A minute later:
“How about now?”
Then:
“I’ve been waiting a long time.”
Behind the counter was the usual McDonald’s rush-hour choreography.
Fries.
Coffee.
Drinks.
Bags.
Employees moving in every direction.
A manager trying to solve five problems at once.
And one day I heard something from behind the counter along the lines of:
“They can wait.”
For some reason, I immediately thought of the guy in the emergency room.
The comparison was almost perfect.
In the ER, you can explain that you’ve already been waiting four hours.
The queue does not become emotionally moved by this information.
At McDonald’s, you can explain that you’ve been waiting fifteen minutes for an order.
The bag does not appear out of respect for your argument.
There is one important difference.
In the ER, you’re mostly losing time.
When you’re delivering, you’re also losing money.
Every minute you stand there is a minute you’re not taking the next order.
So the irritation arrives quickly.
You want to walk up and say:
“Come on. How much longer?”
Then professional self-preservation kicks in.
Because your order is still on the other side of the counter.
And the person you’re about to annoy has much more influence over the next ten minutes of your life than you have over theirs.
Suddenly you become exceptionally polite.
You stand there.
You wait.
Sometimes you even smile.
Every so often, a newer driver loses patience and starts loudly demanding his order.
I watch him with some sympathy.
Rookie.
Nobody prepared him properly.
I had excellent training.
A Montreal emergency room.