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Out
of Line
by Michael Hofferber. Copyright © 1998. All rights reserved. In
the town where I live, there's just one streetlight with one color:
red. It flashes the same in all directions at a four-way stop where one state highway crosses another. The traffic bottles up when a freight train passes through, blocking the north-south lanes. I've seen cars backed up five, maybe six deep... Queued up in one of these small-town traffic jams the other day, I started to reflect on the lines I've waited through and the ones I missed. I used to work in midtown Manhattan, you see, once of the most densely populated places on earth.
After
work, I recall long lines at the half-price ticket booth in Times
Square or the endless queues in front of movie theaters. Checkout lanes at supermarkets were almost always seven or eight deep and the rows of people waiting for taxis after concerts or ballgames were exasperating. Looking back on all the lining up at toll booths, pharmacies ("take a number, please, and wait your turn"), schools, and even fast food drive-up order windows, I wonder how we ever got anything done. Just think of all the productivity lost in lines.
At the post office, my packages are waiting at the counter if they see me coming and even letters that are misaddressed find their way into my box. These days, the only time I spend on line is on the Internet. The shops around here never ask you to queue up for service and whatever can't be purchased locally can be delivered to my door by some parcel service. I eat at restaurants where I'm greeted by name and go to movies at a theater where rapid seating is virtually assured.
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