Does this patio set come with a steering wheel?

There are a lot of jobs I’m glad I haven’t had to tackle in my life — including barn cleaner, Kim Jong Un’s public information officer, police officer, soldier and Tour de France play-by-play announcer chief among them.

I respect the tough job those folks have — I just would never be able to do it, especially the job of police officer. Many of us at some time or another have wished we could be a police officer and crack down on bad guys, especially after watching “Starsky & Hutch” or “Car 54 Where Are You?” But in this day and age where officers face danger at any second while also knowing that their reactions may be analyzed, re-analyzed, over-analyzed, instant-replayed and critiqued by thousands of experts who would have completely freaked out when confronted with the same circumstances, I am incredibly thankful for all those hard-working cops out there while just as grateful I don’t have to spend time in those shoes.

I’m also thankful I’ve never had to be a salesperson. That’s a skill set I just don’t possess. It’s debatable whether you have to actually be a people person to be a successful salesperson, but you at least ought to be able to pretend to like people. I’ve met too many humans in my life to be able to like many of them or pretend to like them.

Plus, I just don’t have the skills of persuasion. I couldn’t sell a $5 Ferrari. Folks wonder how I sold my wife on marrying me, and there’s just no way I could have done it without blackmail. If I can’t sell a $5 Ferrari, I dang sure can’t sell a clunker like myself.

While I’m glad I’ve never had to be a police officer but fully appreciate them, I’ve probably never shown my appreciation for salespeople. Maybe it’s all the cold calls that interrupt me at work with the latest magic bullet that’s going to revolutionize my field. Or maybe it’s all the fake interest car salesmen and others have expressed in my family and such. I just don’t enjoy sales talk or maneuvering.

So, when I know I’m going to come face to face with salespeople, I try to brace myself for it and do my best to show a little humor and respect to make it less painful for both of us. That’s exactly what I did last weekend when my wife dragged me into a furniture store to look for the perfect outdoor dining set.

I’m prepared for furniture salespeople to follow me around endlessly even when I say “I’m just looking, really, and I’m not going to buy anything or steal much.” But I wasn’t prepared to go into sticker shock with every single thing for sale.

I asked the salesman, “Um, where’s the po folks’ furniture?”

“About two blocks thataway,” he said, in all serious with no smile and no sense of humor. My wife, though, kept looking as if we were actually going to pay $3,000 for a patio table and chairs. I don’t pay $3,000 for anything that doesn’t have a steering wheel, three bedrooms or an outboard motor.

While my wife oohed and aahed over all kinds of overpriced stuff, I looked at price tags, rolled my eyes and moved on. The furniture salesman, though, followed my wife around, hoping that she might be the boss of the family — which she totally is. But when I walked out of the store and plopped down on a bench on the street and waited for her to come to her senses, the furniture salesman decided that the jig was up. He must’ve figured that I controlled the purse strings — yeah, right — and disappeared, not even thanking my wife for dragging me in there or for showing genuine interest in their overpriced furniture.

I suspect he suffers from a few male chauvinist misconceptions when a husband and wife walk into the store. But whatever the reason, I’m thankful that your prices turned me against your store — and your attitude turned my wife against it.

I confess that I could never be successful at your job, Mr. Overpriced Furniture Store Salesman, and I’m thankful that last weekend you weren’t very successful at it, either.

This story was originally published June 4, 2016 at 9:18 PM with the headline "Does this patio set come with a steering wheel?."