May I help you?

In one of my previous posts I mentioned that you have to take broken jewelry to a special jewelry repair shop. Here's how I learned that along with a story of one man's offer to help me in a difficult situation.

I have a gold bracelet that broke. I finally got up the nerve to find a place to have it repaired downtown. The guy in the jewelry store told me that I would have to go to the special repair place to have it fixed because they don't do repairs. Thankfully, I already knew the building he told me about, so all I had to do was find the right little shop inside the building. And, actually, I had spotted this particular shop a few days earlier.

Nathan and I set out one day to take the bracelet for repairs . . . well, I guess it was that same day. To get into this building there are a couple of stairs to go down. There are entrance ways on both sides of the building and when you get inside, there is a sort of back and forth staircase and an elevator. Most of the shops in the building are either seamstresses, wedding gown sellers, or candy shops. I thought I remembered the repair place being on an elevator floor (since the elevator skips the half floors), which meant all I had to do that could be challenging was to get the stroller down the steps by myself. It was a little awkward, but we made it inside. As I turned the corner to check out the elevator, I realized that the repair shop was on a half floor, which meant I had to go up half a flight of steps to get there. I didn't want to leave Nathan sitting in the stroller, and I couldn't physically carry the stroller up the steps, so I pulled Nathan out and headed up to the shop.

I gave my bracelet to the guy (who acted like he'd never seen anything so thin and delicate in his life - uh-oh!) and he wrote my name on a little white slip of paper, folded it around the bracelet, and carefully placed it among all the other little glasses pieces (he repairs glasses, too), jewelry, slips of paper, and other junk on his work table. I had a fleeting thought of "How does he find anything in here?" before turning to go out.

I got Nathan situated into the stroller and began to contemplate whether or not I could get him back UP the stairs to get out of the building. I wondered about using the second entrance, but it was even worse because there was a half flight of stairs to get to it. So I had no other option. When we got to the stairs there was a middle-aged man sitting on a bench (smoking and reading the newspaper). Just as I thought about asking him for help, he asked me if he could help. I thought that was great timing! He then proceeded to tell me to turn the stroller around backwards and pull. (OK, great advice, but once you see the poor lady struggling to pull it up the stairs, could you give some REAL help, please?!) This man's behavior is actually totally not normal. Most men would have jumped up in a heartbeat to help carry the stroller up the stairs. Anyway, I finally got the stroller up the stairs all by myself and back onto the sidewalk, no real thanks to my "helper"!

He told me the day I dropped it off it would be done 30 minutes later, but I had something else to do, so I decided to come back another day. One thing after another kept me from going to pick it up sooner, and before I knew it 2 weeks had passed. This time because of the stair situation I left Nathan with Mark and some friends downtown. That made it a lot easier! When I got to the shop I was greeted with, "Welcome! Oh my goodness, I couldn't find it!" He then went on to tell me that he has been looking for my bracelet and can't find it and that just the same morning he told a friend who came to visit that he couldn't find it. They had discussed how mad I would be when I came. I actually didn't feel angry at all. I just thought to myself, "Well, with a workshop that looks like this, I'm not surprised!" I kept wanting to chuckle as he frantically looked through everything on his worktable, all the while muttering under his breath what an awful thing this is. I felt so sorry for him. I told him that if he couldn't find it I would give him my phone number and he could call me when he does. He protested with, "I will find it! How many years have I been doing this, and nothing like this has ever happened!" After 30 more minutes of searching, he still couldn't find it. So he decided it would be best for me to write my number so he could call me. As I was writing my number his friend walked in that told him I would probably come before he was able to find my bracelet. Poor guy!

So after all that, my bracelet is MIA. Who knows if I'll ever see it again! And what did I learn from my "helper" on the bench? Never assume that when someone says, "May I help you?" they mean exactly what you're thinking!