Young cashier mocks eldery woman. But the 'poor lady's' response was a lesson in humility

Nowadays we use technology for everything. Each electronic device needs energy in order to function, and it has lead us to abuse the natural resources.

Newsner reviewed an incident involving an elderly woman who had to remind a Young cashier in a grocery store how life was back in the day.

This story went viral in social media and it has been shared on Facebook alone 1.5 million times. When you learn about it you will understand why. It is not clear whether it is a true story or not but what is important about it is the message it sends.

An elderly woman was coming through this young cashier’s checkout line. As the older lady started checking out, the cashier tried to remind her that using plastic bags for one’s groceries is not the most eco-friendly thing to do nowadays.

The cashier recommended the elderly woman to start bringing her own reusable grocery bags to reduce unnecessary waste. At first, the customer apologized and even explained herself telling the cashier: ‘We didn’t have this ‘green thing’ back in my earlier days.’

‘That’s our problem today. Your generation didn’t consider the environment enough, and you have brought this disaster to the newer generations’, the cashier replied, seemingly offended.

This arrogant accusation to her entire generation by an uninformed youngster gave fuel to the old woman, who decided to teach the girl a lesson reminding her the way things used to work at least 50 years ago in the western world.

‘Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles, and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled,’ started the old lady.

She really had many things to say to prove that when she was young people had habits that were more sustainable than contemporary habits even though back in those days it wasn’t a trend and didn’t even have a name.

The elderly woman went on to inform the cashier about the many uses her generation gave to brown paper bags from groceries, for example, to protect school books to make sure not to damage public property, as the books were passed to other students in time.

The elderly woman went on to inform the cashier about the many uses her generation gave to brown paper bags from groceries, for example, to protect school books to make sure not to damage public property, as the books were passed to other students in time.

She also reminded the girl that back in the day people washed the baby’s diapers instead of using disposables. The old woman kept going about how in her time clothes were dried on a line, using only wind and solar power.

Certainly, her generation relied less on electricity and machines than on their own efforts. ‘We blended and stirred by hand because we didn’t have electric machines to do everything for us.’

These were only a few of the things the old lady pointed out to the baffled cashier in her speech, and the cashier had no words to reply to the proud woman, who finally gathered her things up and left the store.