The ten-thousandth time

A family walks in, unsure. He brings them to the display and explains how it works. Choose the fish yourself. It is priced by weight. Grilled with garlic or fried, rice or bread alongside, the salads arrive first. He points to the sea bream and says it came in this morning.

He has given that explanation more times than he could count. To him it is the most worn speech in the city.

To the family standing over the ice it is new. They have come up from Cairo for the weekend, or they are cousins visiting from abroad, and they do not know whether to point or wait to be seated, or whether the price on the card is for one fish or for a kilo. His tired little speech is the only thing between them and an awkward first ten minutes.

The temptation for anyone who repeats themselves is to start editing for their own sake. Skip the part about weight, because surely everyone knows. Add a joke to keep it lively. Open with the special instead of the basics. Each change makes the speech more interesting to give and less useful to hear.

The man at the ice who is good at his job resists that. He gives the plain version, the way it works, every time, and saves his variations for afterwards, once the family has relaxed.

His boredom is real, but it is his. The people in front of him arrived a minute ago.