Oh So Typical

As much as I am an organizer and a list maker, my system seems to fail me when I’m going out of town. Whether it's going on an overnight trip or an afternoon at my parents’ house, more than likely I’m going to forget something. Several times we’ve made it a few blocks from the house only to turn around and come back to retrieve a forgotten item. Today I found a journal entry I wrote after such an incident this past August. Since it's so typical of me and the way Jim reacts to me, I thought I'd post it on my blog.

August 19, 2009
The car is packed, the house alarm is set, the door is locked and Jim and I get in the car to leave for our trip. As Jim is backing the car out of the driveway he asks, “Did you remember the directions?” Hmmm, let me think. I check the notebook where I had put them and nope, they weren't there. Jim pulls back up to the house. I unlock the door, run inside, turn off the alarm, find the directions, reset the alarm, lock the door, run back to the car and off we go.

Less than two miles from the house I reach for the car charger to the phone only to realize it’s not where I keep it. We pull off the side of the road , search the car and there’s no charger to be found. Back to the house we go and the whole “unlock door, alarm scenario” is repeated.

Knowing where the spare charger is kept, I send Jim to unlock the door, turn off the alarm and grab it, while I keep searching the car for the missing one, simply because I can’t stand to misplace something. After the door is locked and the alarm is set for the third time today, I thought I would lighten the mood that was going south fast. Pretending to find the charger, I said, “Guess what I just found!” As he backed the car out of the driveway, he looked at me in total frustration and said, “I don’t care if you forgot your lung machine, we’re not going back again.”

It never fails when I do something I think is funny and Jim doesn’t see the humor in it, the situation becomes even funnier to me. The more I laugh the more aggravated he becomes. Today I realized this might be a good habit to break. I’m just hoping he doesn’t find the missing phone charger when we unpack the car.