While I was running a cash register, a man came into the store and approached my register. He was very physically antsy and talking very, very fast, he could not seem to stop talking with very pressured speech, and half of what he was saying I couldn't even make sense of. Probably in part because I was trying so hard to focus on ringing up and processing is items right, but also in part because it was all over the place.

I think he mistook my nervousness about being new to cashiering as being uncomfortable with the way he was acting. He asked me and the other cashier if we thought his energy was too much. Without waiting for us to reply he started rambling about how he was having a good day, how he has good days and bad days, and the bad days are very bad but the good days are great. He repeated this in different words a few times while I was making up his change.

My coworkers didn't seem to think anything of it, we do get some drug addicts every shift and I figure they assumed he was one of them, but of course my very first and instant thought was, "Bipolar, he's bipolar!" Of course I was nice to him, but more than anything I felt a weird kindred comfort in recognizing another likely bipolar person. I was very tempted to say something like, "Nah you're fine, I'm bipolar, too, I know how it is," when he started seeming nervous that we were judging him. But luckily I thought better of it at the last moment and didn't want to accidentally embarrass him or anything. After all he might not even be diagnosed.

Anyway not that I'm glad other people suffer or anything, but it was kind of a cool, secret experience to see "one of my people" on the job. When we can recognize each other, it's like we're not so rare.