Manager: Can I help you?
Rob: Yes, I would like to redeem my rewards card for a free sandwich.
Manager: Can I see your card?
Rob: Here. Oh, and don't throw it out. I'd like to keep it after the transaction.
Manager: (Examining the card) You realize that this card expired in 1991?
Rob: No. I hadn't noticed that.
Manager: And judging by the date on it, your first sandwich was purchased over fifteen years ago.
Rob: That may be so, but I did purchase the sandwiches at some point. Didn't I?
Manager: Yes, but we can no longer accept your card. It’s too old.
Rob: Too old? What’s the difference if I bought nine sandwiches fifteen years ago or nine sandwiches yesterday? It’s still nine sandwiches.
Manager: Yes, it is. Just not in this circumstance.
Rob: What circumstance? Just because my card has expired nine isn’t nine?
Manager: Nine is nine. It’s just that...we only honor reward cards from the same millennium they were issued.
Rob: There’s no need to get snotty about it.
Manager: Well, don’t you think your request is a little ludicrous?
Rob: Well, isn’t your establishment the least bit flattered that I’ve held onto this thing for so long? I mean, I’ve travel-ed all the way from New York today and my first thought was to come here, to your restaurant.
Manager: How do we know that? How do we know that you didn’t just find the card on the street?
Rob: On the street? Doesn’t this thing look like it’s been in somebody’s wallet for fifteen years? Frankly, you should be dropping confetti on me. I’m the best costumer you could ever ask for.
Manager: So now you want a basket of cheer for being our customer?
Rob: An acknowledgement wouldn’t hurt.
Manager: Don’t be ridiculous.
Rob: Listen. How would you feel if you were running around with a rewards card in your pocket for the last fifteen years and you made what amounts to a pilgrimage to redeem it, and when you got there they accuse you of trying to use it under false pretenses?
Manager: I wouldn’t know.
Rob: I’ll tell you something else you don’t know. I used to live right up the block on Sacramento Street—next to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s house—across from the park. For the three years that I lived there I was a fixture in this place. Not only was I a regular customer, but I brought in a lot of new ones, too. And to show you that I know a thing or two about your establishment, I happen to know that you have a yearly contest where the winner wins a free cheesesteak a week for life and one of the past winners happens to be in the restaurant right now! Now how would I know that if I wasn’t a regular?
Manager: Well, that doesn’t entitle you to special treatment.
Rob: It kinda does. It at least entitles me to the free sandwich and large soda that I was promised.
Manager: Okay, I’ll tell you what we’ll do. We’ll honor your card but we’re going to have to keep it after the transaction.
Rob: Keep the card? You don't understand. This isn’t about sandwiches or getting freebies. I haven’t held onto this card just so I can come back to San Francisco fifteen years later to clog my arteries on a free sandwich. This is about...it's about nostalgia, and being sentimental.
Manager: Sentimental? Over a stupid rewards card! The only thing that I keep in my wallet is a driver's license. And it’s still valid.
Rob: You see—that’s your problem. If you had an ounce of sentimentality in you, you might learn to fuss about such things as a little stamp on an old rewards card. I’ve had this card for so long that, when I look at it, I don’t think about sandwiches. I think about the times that I had when lived here, which, incidentally, were a lot better than the one I’m having now. If you must know, the reason I’ve held onto the card for so long is because it's an attempt to add a little humor to my life so I don’t grow old and
cynical. Is there anything wrong with that?
Manager: —
Rob: This is also about getting to the punch line. And that punch line is getting the last stamp stamped on this bloody thing and getting the hell out of here. I’m not even hungry.
Manager: Hey man, like, you’re one strange dude.
Rob: Listen. Let me just pay for the sandwich so I can get my card back. Okay?
In the end the manager gave me my free sandwich, stamped the card and told me to keep them both. He undoubtedly thought that I was off my rocker and probably just wanted to get me out of his store. But was I wrong? I didn’t have the nerve to eat my sandwich at the cheesesteak place, so I went up the block to where I used to live on Sacramento Street, next to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s house, and had my sandwich across the street in the park.
Cheesesteak Rewards Card. 1987.
Having left San Francisco in 1991 with nine liberty bell proof of purchases stamped on my rewards card, it was with childlike enthusiasm that I had occasion to return to the City by the Bay and to my favorite Philly Cheesesteak Sandwich Shop many years later. It was a long time coming, but I knew the day would come when I’d get back to my old haunt and receive the tenth stamp, entitling me to a free sandwich and a large soda. When I got there, the place hadn’t changed a bit. I felt right at home standing among the old, but familiar photographs that hung on the walls and the smell of cheesesteak, onion and peppers that wafted lazily throughout the eatery. In my quest to obtain the coveted tenth stamp, it didn't occur to me that it had been over a decade since I was first issued the card and, being that it was now 2003, I might come up against some resistance while trying to redeem it. After ordering my regular sandwich I asked the clerk if he would kindly stamp my card then give it back to me as a souvenir. When my request was denied I asked to see the manager who, moments later, met me at the lunch counter in a grease-spattered apron and a less-than-accommodating attitude. The conversation that followed went something like this: