On Task

My husband came in from work yesterday and noticed that there were boxes in the living room, a sweeper in the entry way and some of the kitchen drawers were on the kitchen table. The day started like this. I was cleaning out the closet under the stairs. It has been a catch all for anything that comes through the front door and doesn’t find its way up the steps. Coats, (which are supposed to be there) boxes of old bills, (Kirk keeps receipts from 1979), boxes of old record albums, (they might be worth something someday, especially the John Travolta/Olivia Newton John unopened one) and boxes of family pictures (mine never make it into albums). I’m cleaning the closet and think, I should sweep it out. I get out the vacuum and set it up. But I notice the whole downstairs needs vacuumed so I stop cleaning the closet and sweep. Done. Back to the closet. Wait, I think I saw some stray pictures in the kitchen junk drawer that should be in the picture box. I walk into the kitchen; pull out the drawer, which sticks from being overfull. And the one next to it is just as bad. I pull out the drawers and set them on the table to clean out after I’m done with the closet. I pull the pics from the drawer and head back to the closet. What’s that I hear? The dryer has shut off. I go upstairs to fold clothes and move the wet ones into the now empty dryer. I sit on the bed and fold the clothes. I won’t put them away, I hate putting away clothes. It’s weird, I love to wash and dry and even fold, but a wall always comes up when it comes to putting the clean clothes away. (I will eventually put them away, just not yet.) I get down off the four foot high bed and remember I have a box of old family pictures under the bed from the time we cleaned out Kirk’s mom’s house after she had passed away. I get down on the floor and reach under for the special box. I set the box on the bed and start going through the pictures. Two hours later, my husband is home wondering why the vacuum is in the entry, the contents of the closet strewn around the living room, kitchen drawers sitting on the table, folded clothes on the bed, where I sit surrounded by pictures. He looks at me in his Kirk way and says, “You need to learn to stay on task.” Oh, how boring my life would be if I stayed on task.

Google It

You’re sitting at the table with the family, trying to remember what actor starred in what movie, and five iPhones come out. (Well, 4 iPhones and one Android…my son doesn’t do Apple.) It’s a race to see who can google the information the quickest.

I personally miss the old days. The days where you would play the "guessing game." Throwing the names and movies back and forth until someone, anyone would come up with the answer. It went like this.

"You know, that guy...the one with the mustache."
“He was in the movie with Nicolas Cage where he was a ghost guy.”

“Ghost rider.”

“Yeah. He played the ghost from the Old West.”

“And he was in the reindeer movie.”

“Rudolph?”

“No, the other reindeer.”

“Dasher, Dancer, Prancer…”

“That’s it. Prancer.”

"Is he married to the lady that was in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid?”

“I think so, what was her name?”

“Something Ross.”

“Katherine.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Is it Sam Ellison?”

“No, but I think that’s close.”

“Elliott, Sam Elliott.”

By now the conversation has hit frenzy. Names and words flying through the air like Nic Cage on the bike in Ghost Rider. I loved it. Getting from point A to point B, everyone getting involved in the chase.

But, now, in two pushes of a button we get Sam Elliott.

Where’s the fun? I remember once we couldn’t come up with the answer and I woke up at two in the morning and yelled “Yentl!!” Kirk didn’t even wake up. But I knew that I had come up with the answer. It was as if I’d won an Olympic Race. Smiling to myself, I rolled over and tried to sleep. But the joy was almost too much to let me sink back into slumber.

Soon, we won’t even need to utilize what little part of the brain we operate on. We’ll merely push a button. But I guarantee the feeling that comes with finding the answer hidden in the recess of your mind will never be replaced by any device. So put them away. Use that brain. Expand that knowledge, because eventually you’ll turn fifty and won’t remember... wait, where was I?

(FYI..I would never forget who Sam Elliott is, it was just an example.)