Quips and Quirks: Episode Three - Time is Marching On and My Mind is Going With It

Have you ever gotten the feeling that you are losing your mind? Not in the old folks kind of way (although I have to admit that as my birthday approaches this year, I have had to really think about whether I am going to be 37 or 36...probably just wishful thinking because alas, I'll be 37) but in the "I used to have it all together" sort of way. I feel this way all the time. Mostly it's due to lack of sleep or lack of sugar (or maybe chocolate). And at these moments when I'm losing my mind, it's also when I wonder where all of the time has gone. (If I'm starting to sound like your lovable old grandpa who told stories about the war, forgive me...I'm just nostalgic that's all.)

Losing my mind started when I had kids but it has manifested into a full blown disorder over the last few years. I rarely leave the house with everything that should be in my purse...namely my phone. I leave the house at least once a day without my phone and either have to run back into the house to hunt it down (thanks to kids who find it and play Doodle Army on it) or I have to completely turn the car around to go back and fetch it (I live in Texas...it's okay to say "fetch" here). Don't even get me started on when we didn't even have to worry about a cell phone or we kept it stashed securely in the trunk of the car for emergencies. Now it's like a lifeline to the world, to anyone who may need to reach me or may need to send me a Facebook message. Truly, having my phone near me at all times has become a compulsion of highest order. And, along with my phone, I am always searching for my keys as well. I know, I know. You're wondering why I don't have a key hook by the door. Oh I don't know. We've never had one so I guess that's my answer. I'll get in the car without my keys and will dig all the way to China in order to get to the bottom of my purse only to discover that not only are they not in there but I have way too many crunched up Goldfish in the bottom of my purse and enough lipsticks to start my own cosmetics line. So back I go in the house to hunt down said keys which inevitably will excite the dog because even though I've only been gone for like a minute, she thinks I'm home again! Woof woof.

At least, I've never left a child at home. Well, not yet anyway.

We did leave the dog outside the other day in the backyard for over 2 hours because we left to go to the gym and I totally forgot to make sure she was safely tucked away in her kennel. I let her out to do her business before we left and forgot she was out there. Boy was she happy when we got home! See what I mean? I'm losing it. Little by little, I'm losing it, I tell ya.

So these temporary lapses in memory have become so routine to me that I might just start to worry if I didn't do them. And then I start to wonder, how long have I actually been this way and when I realize that I've been this way for a while now, I start to really wonder...where has all of the time gone?! (And before any of you who are in your 40s, 50s, or 60s say "You're just a baby!", remember how you felt when you were three years from 40?) Where did the time go, really? Is it locked away in a bottle like that old song says? It's totally cliche what they say about always feeling like you're 20. Only I still feel like I'm no different than I was in high school or college or when I lived footloose and fancy free in California. It's like time stopped in each of those periods but it also kept marching on as well. (Tracy Lawrence has it right "Time Marches On." I used to hate that song. It came out when I was like 22 and I thought it was just so dumb. Uhhhh...of course I would. I was 22. He's right though...march on it does.)

So what am I going to do you ask? I'll build a time machine! Okay, I'm not that smart and I really hate math so that would never work. Maybe I'll just try to go back in time telepathically. I'm not even sure I know what telepathically really means and I'm pretty sure that I couldn't do it because doesn't that require some serious concentration? Let's not get me started on my lack of concentration these days. Maybe I should just decide to consciously work on living in the moment each day (and tell myself that I only need three things when I leave the house...keys, purse, phone...and the kids of course). So hard to do but a worthy goal. And as far as losing my mind goes. Maybe I'll pick up a Sudoku book or the Crossword section of the paper for some mental exercising. Or maybe I'll try to build a house out of a deck of cards (the Brady kids could do it so it can't be thaaaaat hard). Or maybe I'll just switch to dark chocolate instead.