IIT WASN’T EVEN A CONTEST

We sat through a long symphony last night. It lacked excitement and inspiration. Nevertheless, for this couple, the night was a roaring success.

 Not the music:

No, it was the 35-minute preconcert diner before the show. We are an old couple in our eighties, who tried out a modern fast-fast food Five Guyes restaurant. For the shop to operate with five employee, they installed four electronic-order taking-dispensing stations.

My wife and I are accustomed to being greeted by smiling hostesses or cashiers rather than robots. The experience made me think of a senior version of Navy Seal Hell Week.

Entering any crowded of people 65 years our junior was mingling with moon aliens on a planet far-far away. Our Symphony Hall wardrobe didn’t include grunge shorts, crop top tops or peekaboo tattoos, so we knew we were not going to be a perfect fit.

 The clientele also caught on that we weren’t regulars when we spent 20 confused minutes in front of the order placement screen, punching in and replacing orders.

Finally, we proceeded to the checkout station where “Three Guys” greeted us with smiles: The burger wrapping professional, then the condiment specialist and finally the French fry seasoning expert, who did their thing.

Fortunately, we remembered our order number from the order console, picked up our bag, and only then remembered we needed a Coke. Back to Mr. Condiment Guy who directed us back to the  order screen consul yet again. Finally, we picked up a cup and on to a Beveridge station with ten minutes to spare and 35 selection buttons for selections we couldn’t read.  None of the selections were for ice.

 Back to Mr. overworked wrapping Professional to learn the mysteries of the ice dispenser.

All of this should have been a tedious, frustrating, and bewildering ordeal.

On the contrary, we were euphoric that the Five Guys along with their crop top clientele made us feel so welcome into their midst.

We had stumbled into a Martian world, facing impossible challenges and emerged unscathed. What a triumphal experience to be well fed and still in time for the show.   We completed our Navy Seal ordeal hardly breaking a sweat, bonded with aliens and couldn’t have been prouder.