Thanks for No Memories

It’s nice to know that, having lived for half a century, I’ve attained royal status. After all, you like to feel like you’ve accomplished something besides housebreaking the puppy and making sandwiches for four million school lunches during all those years.

Among my set, I’m known as the Post-It Queen. My subjects are thousands of brightly colored sticky notes that remind me not to forget to get gas, pick up the dog at the vet, or buy more sticky notes.

It’s not that my memory is fading, it’s. . .well I’ve forgotten exactly what it is, but I have a plastic tiara on my desk to remind me of what counts. Actually, it can be quite beneficial to be forgetful, particularly when it comes to lunches with people you don’t really care for or foolish promises you’ve made to small children.

However, I read in the paper a while back, I can’t recall exactly when or which one, about a lady that remembers everything, and I mean everything, about her life, from the time she was about eight years old. I don’t envy her. There are things I did when I was eight years old that I would just as soon remain shrouded in the mists of time or at least hidden behind the hot pants at the back of the closet.

Also you have to wonder. Does she ever misplace her car keys or does she just have to remember back to juggling all those grocery bags when she came in and march right back to find them still hanging in the lock?

Does she have to relive that awful time in junior high when she tucked her dress into the back of her pantyhose during the bathroom break after sixth period and strolled down the front hall to the gymnasium affording everyone from the substitute shop teacher to the assistant principal a view of her flowered Fruit of the Looms?

Personally if I have to choose, I’d rather rely on a Hello Kitty sticky note that says Buy Buns than have instant access to every memory that I created before I became royalty. Hindsight may be 20/20, but there are times I’d rather lose my glasses for good than see the flooded toilets and wardrobe malfunctions I’ve left in my majestic wake.

But I would like to know what happened to my car keys.

Key Issue

This afternoon as I fished hysterically in my purse for my stupid car keys that were hiding from me on purpose, I had an idea.

For me, having an idea is a bit like giving birth to a ten pound porcupine. It’s a tedious process, fraught with peril, but quite sharp in the end. What I need is a Global Positioning System that can tell me where in my Super Organizer Bag to find my car keys.

That way I won’t be late for the school pick-up line while I thrash around unsuccessfully in my purse for twenty minutes sifting through stale M&M’s and used Kleenx before attempting to unlock my door with a Number Two pencil and a Twinkie wrapper.

The GPS KeyFinder is sure to be a moneymaker if properly engineered, using language that normal people who don’t factor pi for a hobby can understand. None of this “proceed north past the checkbook for 6 centimeters, turn east at the lipstick, circumnavigate the compact” sort of thing.

My basic concept of direction is this: North is up, South is down, East is left, and West is right. My WWII Navy Dad cringes whenever people ask me for directions. He says if I were in charge of Japanese navigations, Pearl Harbor would have remained untouched. But those elves at the North Pole would still be rebuilding reindeer pens.

I need basic directions. “Plunge hand into the middle compartment with the zipper that’s jammed with the soccer sock. Bypass the garage door opener and orange TicTac, turn left at the chewed cinnamon gum wrapped in foil, continue for the length of the nail file, then shake purse twice firmly. Keys are affixed to the melted Snickers bar by hardened caramel.

I’m not even going to charge the GPS people for this millionaire-making idea. A simple thank you and the knowledge that mommies everywhere will make it to school pick-up on time will be my reward. That and some pizza coupons. And a car with keyless entry.

Now, if I could only find my cell phone, I’d call and tell them. I know it’s here somewhere in my purse. . .

Let Your Fingers Do the Walking

If I see one more women’s magazine exhorting me to walk myself thin, I think I’ll hurl a bucket of brownie mix. If walking made me thin, my weight would register in the negative numbers by now.

Today I walked to the car and back three times. When I made the first trip back to the house to get my car keys, I heard my husband humming and starting the water for a shower. Rounding the corner back into the kitchen, I spied a blue sleeve hanging from the top of the refrigerator (don’t ask), and grabbed the overshirt for my son to wear for “Blue for Spirit” day.

“Here’s you a blue shirt.” I chirped, sliding into the driver’s seat.

“Grunt,” he replied. Since I happen to know that a single syllable grunt is teenagerspeak for “Thanks Mom, without you I would be like a wireless game controller with dead batteries,” I was overcome with maternal love. Until I realized he had also forgotten his shoes.

Sending that boy back into the house is like watching an Infomercial for the Thighmaster and waiting for plot development.

I jogged up the hill and took the steps to the back door two at a time. It took me three laps down the hall, through his room, and around the kitchen table before I found two shoes that matched. I decided not to ask about the cross-trainer in the microwave. In the shower, Hubby was midway through "The House of the Rising Sun" with accompanying voice-produced instrumentals.

“Ready to go?” I asked wearily as I climbed into the car, sucking up some early morning effervescence from the caffeine-loaded diet soda I kept in the drink holder.

Grunt.

“I love you too, Sweetie,” I beamed and reached for the keys. The keys that were still in the house where I’d dropped them to get the Spirit Shirt. Shouldering open the car door, I trudged the winding trail to the kitchen door and snagged the keys.

Back in the car, I sank again into the driver’s seat. Sweat was battling hairspray for control of my ’do. “Let’s go. We’re late.”

Grunt.

“Do you really need your band instrument every day? Aren't the notes the same as yesterday?”

Raised eyebrow.

I opened the car door and looked up the steep, rock-strewn hill toward the house. Then I whipped out my cell phone. A musical, waterlogged voice answered.

Why should I reap all the benefits of walking? Last night over dessert, I noticed Hubby has some love handles that definitely could use some work.