Planning and packing for a trip takes 99% of the roughly 8% of my brain I am currently using.
There are some things you can do without even thinking about it, things that comes as natural to you as mouth-breathing was to a caveman.
For some athletics come easy; they have been catching balls or hitting slap shots since infancy and the desire to do so was always kind of around.
Some folks were born organized. The desire for order and structure are ever-present and they were probably organizing their own diaper bags(“Let's see, daytime diapers go here, overnights go right here and my selection of color coded pacifiers fits nicely here“) and writing memos to their mothers about the water-to-powder ratio in their formula mix (“Just a teaspoon more of Perrier water should do the trick mother“).
It’s not to say that there is not work and effort involved in being a truly great athlete or an organizing guru with your own line of self help books and a cable access TV show, it’s just that the original spark was there in most of these folks and absent in the rest of us.
For me, being creative always just sort came easy. I was making up stories since infancy, and thanks to a wonderful mother with a distinct collector’s gene, I have every story and scrap of creative idea that I ever had gumption to put down on paper. (Including the Pulitzer Prize worthy first grade story “Mighty Mustard and Crazy Catsup Fight the Evil Mayonnaise Man”, a story so profound and insightful that my teacher wept openly and sent it straight to the White House to be awarded a medal of honor.)
I have friends for whom public speaking or other creative endeavors are truly stressful ordeals. They sweat for weeks trying to come up with an original idea for a ten minute presentation. It takes everything they have.
But not this cat, I could write this column in my sleep. (Don’t tell my editor this, please!) Being funny and creative come pretty easy to me. (Of course the “funny” part is much more subjective than, say, the ability to shoot a basketball well, and depends greatly on the audience. I am considered a comedy genius in parts of the South and in the country of Korea, but people in Idaho and Russia have expressly told me to find another line of work.)
But what I find incredibly difficult is organizing my life, say for something like packing for the vacation I am currently enjoying on a beach in a certain state north of here. (Incidentally, the sand just now is warm and the gulls are circling overhead. Circling, circling…Oh no, everybody put up your umbrellas!)
Packing for a vacation that involves children takes about as much planning and forethought as the D-day invasion of France, only those brave soldiers never had to worry about running out of diapers on the turnpike in 100 degree weather.
I have learned that if I spread out the packing over the course of, say, five days, life is much easier.
Of course with five days to go till V-day my brain says to me “take it easy big guy; there’s plenty of time to make that checklist.”
Then, with less than twenty hours to go the panic button deep in the recesses of my subconscious finally gets pressed and it’s time to start thinking about what the family will need while “relaxing” somewhere.
Because if there is not a bit of forethought you will spend all of your precious beach time running from store to store trying to find that elusive item that you have ten of at home, yet here you are buying the eleventh one (say a child’s bathing suit or a cell phone re-charger). Also, that money you are spending on the fourteenth pair of flip-flops could be better spent on a novelty t-shirt that says “Maine, The Ninth Best Place To Live In America“, or “Maine, Now With Indoor Plumbing!”
And don’t forget that precious and beloved stuffed animal that your child can not sleep without. It would be better to forget the first aid kit or the tooth paste than this critically important and ragged ball of cotton with eyes on it. (“Is that a sheep or a monkey sweet heart? Oh, it’s a camel!”)
I call this whole packing and planning activity “Operation ’No Stuffed Animal Left Behind’.”
I can say with full confidence and swagger that this particular vacation I’m on was pulled off nicely and it helped that I put every single stuffed animal in my house in a garbage bag and brought them all along.
Now if you will excuse me, I think I spy an ice cream stand on the boardwalk.
And since I didn’t have to buy those flip flops, I think I’ll get a chocolate sundae.
