I ordered a mandoline from the internet in April, and last week I finally admitted that I wasn’t going to learn to use it.
The mandoline came with a finger guard. I know this because the first thing the instructions said was “ALWAYS use the finger guard.” The instruction was in red. Instructions in red are serious instructions. I used the finger guard three times, decided the risk was manageable without it, and within about forty seconds understood why the instructions were in red. Don drove me to urgent care. The mandoline was returned to its box. The question was now what to do with the box.
The answer, it turned out, was not simple.
I found the order confirmation email after approximately twenty minutes. It was from April 9th, which I mention because I had been telling myself it was probably the fifteenth or sixteenth. It was the ninth. I had been meaning to return this mandoline for three months without fully realizing it. I found the email by searching for the word “mandoline” and receiving eleven results: eight newsletters I have no memory of subscribing to, two recipes I must have saved, and one order confirmation. I clicked the link for returns. The link asked me to log in.
I logged in. Or I tried to log in. The password I use for shopping did not work on this particular website, because this website had requirements: a capital letter, a number, a symbol, and the symbol couldn’t be a period or a parenthesis, which eliminated most of my symbols. I created a new password. I wrote it on a notepad. The website then informed me I had exceeded my login attempts and needed to verify my identity by email. I went to the email, clicked the link, and returned to the website, which had logged me out while I was gone.
I eventually reached the returns page. I was eligible for a full refund. The returns page explained that I needed to print a shipping label.
I don’t have a printer.
We had a printer for many years. It sat in the office and worked adequately until it stopped working, at which point Don examined it and said it needed an update. The update ran for forty-five minutes and the printer still didn’t work. Don said it probably needed a new cartridge. We bought one. The printer still didn’t work. Don said sometimes you have to uninstall the driver and reinstall it. I nodded as though I understood what those words meant in that order. We didn’t pursue the reinstallation. The printer sat in the office for another eight months, a monument to optimism, and then we donated it to the church rummage sale, where someone presumably could reinstall things.
Don has a printer in the garage. It’s connected to his woodworking computer, which is a regular computer in the sense that it has a keyboard and a screen and Don understands it. I explained the situation. Don printed the label without complaint, which is Don’s general method of operation: he identifies what needs doing and does it, without editorial comment. The label came out in a color I can only describe as discouraged gray, as though the printer was doing its best but had reservations about the whole enterprise.
The UPS store turned out to be on Henderson Road. Kevin found it for me while we were on the phone on Sunday. I had known Henderson Road existed the way I know most roads exist: as a geographical fact I had not personally tested. It’s next to a dry cleaner I’ve driven past for years and filed mentally under “still there.”
The UPS store employee scanned the label without comment. I don’t know whether the discouraged gray raised any concerns or whether he simply maintained a professional neutrality about all packages regardless of their condition. He gave me a receipt. The refund would arrive in five to seven business days, he explained, once the package reached the warehouse.
On the third day, I received a survey asking about my return experience.
The survey asked whether I’d found the returns page easy to navigate, how I would rate the process on a scale of one to five, and whether I would recommend the company’s returns experience to a friend. I sat with the survey for a moment. I thought about the twenty minutes finding the confirmation, the password situation, the verification email, the printer that was in the garage of a man who does not complain, and Henderson Road. I gave it three stars. Three stars is the rating I give when I am being honest but not unkind.
The refund arrived on day six. On day seven, the company sent me an email suggesting I might enjoy a julienne peeler.
I appreciate the thought. I do. But I’m still wearing the bandage.
