David Murdock sees the high cost of everything

This impersonal, ageless memory floats in my head – I’m not sure it really happened. I’m handing out the candy bar to the cashier at the convenience store. After she scans it, I give her a dollar bill. She looks at me with a questioning face and has a strange pause. I have to say something, but before I open my mouth, she says, “It’s a dollar-fifty.” “Oh,” I say, handing out another dollar.

As I said, it is not a true memory as much as a blend of experiences I have had for years now. Every time I walk out of the store and the cashier tells me the price, I have an overwhelming desire to complain about how expensive things were when I was young. The phrase “when I was your age …” slips out of my mouth before I can stop it.

At least I learned to play it as a joke. Most younger cashiers have heard old people say, which irritates them. It did when I ran the cash register. The excitement of complaining about the cost of things was a bit old when I remembered how tedious it was to ask the same thing when I was younger. I sometimes wonder if young people have invented self-checkout registers so they don’t have to ask for it.