yes.

For years, people have been telling me to say “no” to things. I do have a tendency to say “yes” so often (people pleaser, here) that I eventually hit my breaking point of “too much.”  Those moments of hustle turn to an unhealthy boil and eventually boil over in an embarrassing meltdown of epic proportion on an unsuspecting victim. Example: the sixteen-ish-year-old drive thru clerk at Chick-Fil-A in the spring of 2015. I learned that new hormones + crazy training schedule + too much professional “yes” + no wallet = a cascade of tears and one free Grilled Chicken Cool Wrap with a diet lemonade.
 
Sweet Chick-Fil-A, where everything really is their pleasure, gave me my meal either as a generous gesture of hope or as a way to prevent me from holding up their flawlessly timed drive thru. Either way, once the emotional avalanche settled, guilt and sheer embarrassment set it. Luckily, this was the CFA in Cleveland, Georgia not the one in Gainesville where all my students worked. By the time, I reached “the tiny house experiment,” I knew that I had once again hit the familiar wall of “too much.”
 
Before enjoying my free meal, I called back to CFA to ask the name of the young lady whom I had just traumatized. I learned her name was Emilie and that she would be opening two mornings from now. I knew I had to rectify my behavior. Not only because I live in this tiny town with a very distinctive little yellow car, but also because it was the right thing to do.
 
Two mornings later, I pulled into the drive thru and greeted Emilie with a Starbucks latte purchased from inside our Ingles grocery store. I apologized for my epic meltdown and Emilie graciously accepted. But the guilt didn’t stop there. I also offered to pay it forward by purchasing the order from the car behind me. This was not an honorable or a noble gesture; it was a guilt gesture. You see this is where too much “yes” always leaves me; embarrassed, guilty, and thirty-eight dollars lighter. (And in case you are like me and are wondering how many chicken biscuits you can buy with $38, my rough calculation is 17! You’re welcome Cleveland resident).

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