Some one once said to me, “never, under any circumstances, take a laxative and a sleeping pill on the same night..”
It’s good advice…and before you start snickering, I didn’t do it, take a sleeping pill and laxative on the same night, but last week I did throw down a couple of shots of Jagermeister, after drinking a gin and tonic and a few bottles of some IPA my co-worker–who likes to talk on end about IPAs as though they’re grown in Napa Valley–demanded that I try.
I walked home and didn’t feel half bad when I got into bed. My wife, as she is wont to do when I come home from the Crow’s Nest bar, rolled over and mumbled, “you smell like a brewery”. To which I said, “I love you”, which I meant, because I do love her and she rolled back over toward me, kissed me on the lips, then whispered, “Sammy has a soccer game at 7am”, the rolled back over.
The next morning I rolled out of bed and went to soccer practice with Sammy. And came home and did a bunch of stuff too boring to repeat and went to bed that night and woke up and went to work. I did the same thing the next day and the next. On Friday afternoon I sat in the break room at the office and tried to remember where the week went–it disappeared somehow, like the fog over Lake Erie. A guy I work with, John Rosenfeld, who we call Rosie, ventured in and sat down next to me, and said, as he always does, “how was your week, Joe?”
So I told him. I looked him in the eye and said, “Every work day I drag my sorry ass out of bed, look at the sky and try to guess what time it is, but I already know–it’s 6:30am, because that’s†the time I get up every morning to go to work. I shower, but I don’t shave; I put on deodorant, but not cologne”.
Rosie raises his index finger, and opens his mouth, but I’m wasn’t stopping.
“I generally don’t eat anything in the morning. I used to like Cap’n Crunch but it got expensive, so I gave up on breakfast. I make a lunch, put it in†this lunchbox I inherited from my youngest son–it has slots for these ice packs that you put in the freezer overnight, which is clever, then I put on†a shirt, lace up the shoes and head out the door.I do this everyday. I don’t think about it much”.
Rosie stood up, said “good seein’ ya, Joe, and bolted before I could start up again. He missed the best part of the story.
On Friday morning, standing in a bus aisle between a heavyset young woman holding the hand of a little†boy–only she wasn’t really holding his hand, she was gripping his wrist so that he wouldn’t dare try to bolt–on the other side of me was a man holding–I shit you not–a ukulele. Why? I didn’t ask him.
As the bus rumbled down the street, I started to think. Normally I’m not ruminating about much before I get to work, but I can’t help but wonder why the guy is toting around a ukulele, which got me thinking: what do I carry with me every day, and why?
So, there on the bus, I did a total assessment of my tote-ables.
In my right front pocket I had my keys. There’s a key for the front door, a key for my car, which is an old-ass Prius, which is in the shop, which is why I am on the bus; a key to my wine cellar–just†kidding, no wine celler, but there was another key and I did’t know what the hell it went to. I keep it because I know if I throw it away, within 15 minutes I will need it. In my other front pocket I have my phone. It’s an old iPhone, and it doesn’t get used much, and it’s sat there so long that there is a worn out shape of the phone on the front of my pants.
In my back pocket is my wallet. In the part where you put your currency, I had two one dollar bills and a receipt from Jack in The Box. I had a fish†sandwich meal. I got curly fries and an ice tea with it, and I remembered that I was supposed to throw away the receipt because I didn’t want my wife†to find it and give me shit for A) not eating my sack lunch, and B) not getting her something, because she likes the monster tacos. If I didn’t occasionally sneak a fast food lunch I would probably flip the fuck out someday, because man can eat his lunch every day out of his teenage son’s lunch bag, even if it does have ice packs.†
In the smaller compartments I had pictures of the kids. In one of them my youngest son was wearing a soccer uniform, and a sort of sad picture of my older son taken at his eighth grade graduation–he had the kind of acne that is horrifying and sad at the same time.
In my shirt pocket I had a piece of paper on which I had written: TO DO, only it was a few days old and I hadn’t done anything on the list, include bring the shirt to the cleaners.
Around my neck I wear a crucifix. On the back of it is an inscription: I AM A CATHOLIC. PLEASE CALL A PRIEST. Frankly, I would prefer that if I was so incapacitated that someone was looking at the cross, they would call a paramedic, not a priest.
I unzipped the lunchbox. Inside was a ham sandwich, made with wheat bread, which is supposed to be healthier than white bread but this loaf came from the 99 cent store so I doubt that it was packin’ too many nutrients; an apple, a diet coke, and crunch bar for a snack, and a bag of Fritos. Fritos, by†the way, may be the saltiest food in the world. After one bag–and it’s not a big bag–I’m as thirsty as if I had just run a marathon–in the Mohave desert.
And that’s it.
That’s what I am toting. If I got hit by a bus and died, they could put everything in a small plastic bag–they’d throw out the lunch–and†give it to my wife, who would pocket the dollar bills, glare at the Jack in the Box receipt, take the pictures, and try to figure out what the†extra key was for…then she would take the cross off my neck, put it in the little porcelain jar she keeps next to the bed, or maybe give it to one of our sons.
TASK
Inventory your tote-ables, gentlemen. Then think about what that means.
—
Check out our programs and sponsorship offers for #EarthDay #GreenerTogether https://t.co/skEK7AFW1M pic.twitter.com/7fqNTzRiUU
— The Good Men Project (@GoodMenProject) March 10, 2019
—
It’s never too early to start talking about Father’s Day on The Good Men Project. We’re looking for sponsors and contributors for our #ModernDayDad campaign. https://t.co/WJvKqq2kTe pic.twitter.com/j66LNCY0VG
— The Good Men Project (@GoodMenProject) March 11, 2019
—
We celebrate Gay Pride all year long. But this year, we’re doing some special programing for a large-scale campaign #LoveEqually. We’re looking for both sponsors and contributors. Check it out! https://t.co/tkraXFPxLL pic.twitter.com/X2FlBEZb8Y
— The Good Men Project (@GoodMenProject) March 11, 2019
Image ID: 1336056908