SURLY RECEPTIONISTS

Those who work in doctors' offices should be especially
kind and gentle, for the patients who are waiting anxiously
to be seen by a physician, little knowing what's in store,
or who may have seen a doctor and are worried even more,
need to know that a receptionist perceives and understands
what they're feeling when they put their life into a doctor's hands.
I was sitting in a doctor's office just the other day
and could not believe someone would speak in such a callous way
to a woman who was asking how much longer it would be.
That she wasn't feeling well at all, most anyone could see.
If a person is compassionate, it should, in any case
be reflected in one's voice and the expression on one's face.
This receptionist, however, showed no sympathy at all
to the woman, who was fighting back the tears, as I recall.
Then I thought: maybe the surly one is not always that way;
it could be that things had not been going well for her that day.
But I asked myself this question, as I pondered that a while,
is it wrong for patients to expect receptionists to smile?

Richard Stoll Armstrong