432. Hermit

That is it. I want to become a hermit, I've got it all planned. I've got the house. I've got the woods, I've got a well - somewhere ... And I've got a copy of Walden - somewhere ...

I cannot deal with this modern world anymore. I have just spent close to an hour (48 minutes exactly) on the phone to open an account with an electricity company so that Baby can boil her pasta in her 18 square meter-flat.

It had started with the automatic answering message saying that I didn't need to worry because while I was waiting the cost was just the normal cost of a local call. But all my calls are done on WhatsApp and are free I wanted to yell to this stupid voice bragging about making me pay while I was waiting for someone to reply. I couldn't follow. And I hadn't even spoke to anyone yet!

Then someone picked up. I was so surprised I didn't reply thinking it was a robot.

'Is someone there? I'm ready to helped.' And then I thought I'd give it a go and the robot turned out to be human! 

And the human started with the over-the-top warm welcome from the girl with a foreign accent. That was fine I could deal with that. Then we I finally could speak I had to deal with the over-the-top apologies for messing up the calling Baby back and having the mother instead (no comment here) and I wished so much everybody in life would apologise to me like this that I was racking my brains to find out if I could find something else that was no handled well. Surprisingly I could find nothing so we moved on. She had to get my name right and my husband's too and once she got all the names and the address she said we could start. And she addressed me by my full name, both Christian names and the family name. Preceded with Madame. The effect was mind-numbing and I think it is a technique to make the irate customer less agressive. I wasn't even agressive. She was funny and she seemed genuinely keen to help me.

Then I had to answer a list of questions about the equipment in the flat.

'A fridge?

'Yes.'

'A separate freezer?'

'A freezer?'

'Yes, does she have a freezer?'

'No. She'll be lucky to fit a bed and a desk in there so no, no freezer.'

A freezer! I thought to myself, what a stupid idea! I was racing my eyes while on the phone.

'A washing machine?'

'No. No washing machine.'

'A dishwasher?'

This was ridiculous. A dishwasher! A freezer! Was I going to have to go through the whole catalogue of the local electrical store: irons, popcorn machine, candy floss machine, percolators, kettles, hoovers and raclette machines?

'A dishwasher! No, goodness me, no, no dishwasher! She's a student!'

The woman did not laugh. Maybe she had kids who were students and had fully equipped flats. Maybe she was judging me? The bad mother from the West, letting her daughter wash her clothes in the sink and not even have ice cream when she feels a little down. That's when I started to think about it, about retiring to the little house by the woods and becoming a hermit.

'Sorry?'

'Is the heating individual or common?'

I had absolutely no idea. I could try to text Baby at the same time but a) I might get all mixed up and cutter off and that would be a catastrophe and b) Baby was in class and she would be horrified to have her mother texting her during lessons. (That's why I was phoning you see)

'Individual.' After all she had just asked if she had a dishwasher and a washing machine so an individual heating wasn't that much over the top.

'The address?'

The address? No idea. I thought about telling her that Baby was the last kid to go to uni and that the novelty had worn off ... then I texted a colleague whose daughter was there too, and I texted my daughter. Who'd get back to me first? The colleague won.

Then I knew we were getting near the end as she called me by my full name again but it wasn't to say good bye, it was to tell me about a system of points and rewards.

'You can collect point and then you get a present.'

'A present? What kind of present?'

I was expecting a big discount (the monthly bill was huge for such a tiny flat with nothing in it except an individual heating system i.e. a radiator. What luxury!

'You can get the list on the website, on your customer's page.'

No real discount then. No way I was going to check the webpage after spending an hour on the phone. 

And then we had to fit numbers in boxes and that took ages and then in the end she said good bye. And I was the exhausted one! And I was incredibly surprised that I had not lost my temper with her. But that was I thought because I knew I would never have to deal with this again once I was a hermit.

I wonder if hermits pay taxes though.