Kathleen McCall:
Occasional�� Muse�

2001-08-20 - 8:48 a.m.

Don't Do That, Idiot

I lost the salt and pepper.

I lost them for a whole week. No idea where they'd gone. David came wandering in today with them in his hand. "Where'd you find those?" He waved, kind of the general direction of the living room. Oh, of course.

It's not so amazing that I would lose the salt and pepper, I guess, but it's amazing that it didn't surprise me. It's the way I keep house. I did look for them, in a rather hopeless way, because I know I am powerless over inanimate objects in my house; but when they didn't turn up, I just let go and let God. If I am meant to have salt and pepper, I trust they will be provided in a timely way. I have more faith than sense sometimes.

I probably took them in the living room, all the while thinking to myself, "Don't do this, idiot. You know you will put them down in there and have no idea where they are for weeks." Then arguing with myself, "No, the fact that I am conscious of it, that I am actually thinking Don't Do This, Idiot, will protect me. I WILL remember that the pepper grinder is on the table behind the couch - how could I forget?"

"Don't do that, idiot. If you put the oil cap in the oily rag on top of the engine block, you will forget it's in there and grab the rag to wipe the dipstick and the oil cap will sail out and clunkclunkclunk into that space in the engine compartment which cannot be reached with any instrument known to man, which is probably where the salt and pepper are right now. You know you will." Predictable, eh? Clunkclunkclunk. Why don't they ever fall through to the ground? If I stood there and pitched things into the engine compartment deliberately, I bet I couldn't get a single thing to stick in there. It'd all end up on the garage floor. But the oil cap never ever falls through. It's rigged, like a fairgrounds dime toss, where I never win the ashtray.

"Don't do that, idiot. The last time you put a gallon of milk on the roof of the car for JUST A MINUTE while you unlocked the door, that nice lady had to honk at you as you drove away until you quit gaping stupidly at her and remembered. You know you do it every time." Or the travel cup of coffee, or on one memorable occasion, my wallet. Ever hear that story about the lady who drove off with the infant in a carseat on the roof of her car? I don't know her, but I think we're related.

"Don't do that, idiot. If you put your eyeglasses on top of the VCR while you read the back of the video box, you will be blind for the rest of the evening, looking in stupid places like your glasses case and on your bedside table or even in the tray you have for glasses on your worktable. You will be reduced to retracing your steps: "I first got glasses when I was in fifth grade..." and you may end up driving the kids to school in the morning while peering over the steering wheel and hoping not to locate anybody's Burmese by Bumper Braille."

I'm slow on the uptake sometimes. More than sometimes. And it's still amazing that I would remember these incidents well enough to write about them, but I still cannot remember for five minutes that if I dump an entire serving bowl of elderly chili down the sink without checking first, it is guaranteed that there will be a nectarine pit or a water bottle cap in the Dispos-all.. "Don't do that, idiot. If you don't check first, you might as well just plunge your hand into that cold chili while it's still in the bowl. You KNOW this."

Yup. Slow on the uptake. Forty-four years in Remedial Living, and I've only gotten as far as KNOWING what I'm about to do isn't smart, but not far enough not to do it.

�

previous - next

�