Oh, B&N

I learn a lot from the customers that come into Barnes and Noble.
Sometimes customers choose to educate me on the latest sci-fi novel that I MUST read, or the details of their favorite romance novel or they kindly let me know that Marge Simpson was featured in Playboy (ummm, yeah ... I am not even going to address that here). These enlightening moments are the ones that I try to avoid.
Other customers teach me things like patience, or kindness or (at the very least) self-control -- I am talking about the needy customers who want help finding 5 obscure books, or the rude customers who effectively treat me as their retail slave, or the packs of teenagers that stand in the sex section and giggle for an hour. I couldn't avoid these customers even if I wanted to -- they find me.
But, in all fairness, most customers don't fit into the aforementioned categories. They are just good people who are quick to engage in conversation about the books they have come to find. And I love it.
For example, I learned a lot about lyme disease from a woman the other day. We spent a good amount of time at the computer trying to find a book on the disease, so I casually mentioned that I know nothing about it. That was one of the many blessing of growing up in the great state of Colorado ... I didn't even know what ticks were until fairly recently. So she started telling me about the disease and its symptoms, the way it is typically transmitted, etc. What was most surprising to me was the debate in the medical community about the validity of chronic lyme disease. I forget that there is so much subjectivity in medicine ... it seems a lot of suffering is ignored in the middle of the debate. This woman was talking about her husband. She was telling me that he has had all the classic symptoms for 5 years, but that many doctors dismiss the notion that lyme disease is present. She didn't say anything especially heart-wrenching, but she has clearly borne his burden. It makes me want to be a lyme disease advocate. Something that I would never have cared about except for the generous conversation of a customer.
And then, tonight, I learned about this philosopher named Edmund Gettier. A guy in his early twenties (whose fashion sense screamed, 'I am so Enlightened!') came to find a book on this philosopher and was dismayed to find that no such book exists. So I asked him who Gettier is, and he told me that in one 3-page paper, Gettier demolished one of the most basic philosophic tenants. Since Plato, knowledge has been generally defined as 'justified true belief.' And, in three pages, this guy moves to shut down a legacy of thought. In three pages, he moved a whole discipline to reconsider it's understanding of knowledge. Crazy. So I learned three things from this customer: (1) the name and significance of an important 20th century thinker, (2) that words are immensely powerful ... probably more so than we will ever understand, (3) that I don't know much at all. {{ ** Side note: this customer looked about as directionless as anyone I've met ... I saw a latent intellectual hopelessness in him. Jesus, meet this man and show him what knowledge is and from Whom it comes. }}
People are treasure-troves of wonderful stories, thoughts, information, interests, passions -- the moments where I chose to operate out of this truth are the best moments at work for me.