Rejection on the doors is a daily thing, and typically it's the same answers you get from everyone. You get pretty good at diverting away from peoples objections and getting them to listen to you, but every now and then you come across a situation that leaves you basically dumbfounded.
So I was knocking a bit ago and I saw an open door behind a screen, a tell-tale sign that someone is home, so I gave 'er a knock.
This old man came out and I started doing my introduction, but instead of listening to me he just walked right up to me and grabbed the name badge that I wear around my neck and held it about 6 inches from his face. He hadn't said a word, and I just stopped talking because he was uncomfortably close...
After inspecting my badge for about 5 seconds, he turned around to walk back in the house. I wasn't going to let him get away that easily, so I started talking to him again, but he just held up a finger and said "I'm deaf" in that cliche deaf voice and walked back into the house. I wondered how he heard me knocking...
A few seconds later a decently good looking younger woman came out so I started talking to her, but no sooner had I started than she began to sign like crazy to me.
I stopped talking again, silently cursing myself for not learning ASL like I've been meaning to for the past couple of years and considering that there was a 50/50 shot that this girl was faking. I tried asking her if there was anyone who wasn't deaf in the house, but she just started gesturing for me to write it down. At this point I was losing hope, so I just decided to wing my pitch. I wrote on that back of a prequalification slip: "I'm doing some advertising for Honeywell home security systems and paying for 3 in your neighborhood today."
You can see her reply in the photo above. I normally wouldn't let her get off that easily, but I've never been rejected in writing before...
As a side note, the house may or may not have been a mosquito farm. All I know is that my legs got absolutely mutilated while standing there. It was bad news.
-Daniel Wilson
megadanny@gmail.com
(email sent via blackberry)
