The promise was broken the instant it was made.

It happened in a busy store, with one person on duty at the counter. He was helping one customer, while another two people were waiting to pick up their orders.

sa国际传媒淚sa国际传媒檒l be with you in just a second,sa国际传媒� the counter worker said to a customer who had just walked in the door.

The clerk was working as quickly as he could, putting a previous customersa国际传媒檚 purchases into a bag. He was fast, but there was no way he could be with the new customer in sa国际传媒渏ust a second.sa国际传媒� I started to count off the seconds. I got to 23 before the clerk was able to help his latest customer.

I doubt if anyone else in the store noticed the expression. sa国际传媒淛ust a secondsa国际传媒� has become commonplace and it is seen as nothing more than a figure of speech.

Sometimes itsa国际传媒檚 said as sa国际传媒渢wo secssa国际传媒� or sa国际传媒渉alf a secsa国际传媒� instead of one second, but the meaning is similar.

Waiting at a counter for 23 seconds is hardly an inconvenience. A red light at an intersection will last longer. Same with heating a plate of food in a microwave. A typical commercial break during a television show lasts for a few minutes.

But thatsa国际传媒檚 not the point.

While the phrase, sa国际传媒淛ust a second,sa国际传媒� is used to refer to a brief interval of time, a second is also a precise measurement of time. The International System of Units has a calculation for a second.

There are 24 hours in a day. Thatsa国际传媒檚 all. Itsa国际传媒檚 a limited amount of time. Subtract time for essentials such as eating and sleeping and the day has fewer hours left when things can be accomplished.

Those same 24 hours can be counted as 1,440 minutes or 86,400 seconds.

No matter how one divides a day, the result is the same.

There is no way to deliver on the promise of help within a single second. Even the words, sa国际传媒渏ust a second,sa国际传媒� will take several seconds to say sa国际传媒� unless someone talks extremely fast.

As for the task itself, I cansa国际传媒檛 think of anything that can be accomplished in a single second.

At the same time, the phrase, sa国际传媒淛ust a second,sa国际传媒� acknowledges the busy schedules that are a fact of life for many.

Time is limited, and for some who have busy schedules, any time-saving measures and efficiencies are valued. This is the reason why well-run customer service help lines will tell the caller how many minutes he or she should expect to wait. 

Itsa国际传媒檚 also the reason behind the development of the elevator pitch. This is a presentation that can be made in the amount of time it takes for an elevator to go from the first floor to the second floor of a building.

Or, for something even more concise, theresa国际传媒檚 the escalator pitch. Here, the timeline is shortened to the amount of time it takes for someone on the downward escalator to pitch the concept to someone on the upward escalator. Instead of half a minute sa国际传媒� already a short timeline sa国际传媒� the concept needs to be presented in a single sentence.

These measures and others recognize the value placed on a personsa国际传媒檚 time sa国际传媒� and they do it without making impossible promises of instant action.

John Arendt is the editor of the Summerland Review.