A Day in the Life

It was one of those days for me.

It began innocuously enough. I had recently gotten a pair of sweat pants to wear around the house. The kind where it is hard to tell the front from the back. At least for me.

"Are your pants on backwards" my wife asked in that incredulous, yet resigned to spending the rest of her life with this idiot, tone that connotes both wonder and despair.

"Well, there is no way to know the difference" I informed her in an almost pleading voice that spoke of my desperate incompetency.

"You have drawstrings" my son announced. No I don't I thought, although I knew I was clearly overmatched by the complexity of this attire.

"I have to text my sister", but then he took pity on me and let it go. And so this would merely be recorded in my book of life as episode 10,321, or something like that, in the chronicles of why I am a danger to myself and others.

And then it got worse. By a lot.

My wife and I planned a short hike with our son in law, our 17 month old granddaughter, along with a couple who was visiting them with their 7 month old son.

Anyway, it was a morning marked by an unexpected, beautiful snowstorm. And thus our hike along a somewhat turbulent stream leading to a churning waterfall was picture perfect (actually a few pictures perfect). I had begged off the task of photographer, leaving it to my wife, knowing if the job had fallen to me there would be many images of my finger and little else. 

As the walk concluded, I choreographed our journey back home: a stop at Crossroads, a great lunch place a few miles away, then dropping my wife and me off at our apartment before the rest wandered back to the house my daughter and son-in-law had rented. As I was the one most familiar with this area, I would direct from the passenger seat in the lead car, my wife, son-in-law and granddaughter trailing in the second vehicle.

"Did you miss the turn for Crossroads?" It was my wife calling, that how did that happen question ringing in my ear. The truth is I had forgotten. In the minutes that it took from my mapping out our future to it actually transpiring, the thoughts had left my brain and were lying somewhere by the side of the road, shivering from the cold, bewildered and totally exposed to the elements.

"Don't worry." It was now my son in law's voice. "We will just head home, put the kids down for a nap and figure out lunch then." You see, my family is actually quite protective of me and their words most often treat me with tender care, my inadequacies hidden behind their affection.

My sole remaining task was to direct my driver, the weekend guest of my daughter and son in law, to my residence.

"Did you forget to tell him to turn on our street?" It was my wife calling again. And yes, I most definitely had. We were now a block or two past the left we were intended to make, but there was an easy alternate route available.

"It is not a big deal. It is just as fast this way." Even my driver, who was not otherwise aware of just how utterly damaged a being I was, had caught on. He too was excusing my glaring deficiencies in an obvious act of charity.

Shortly thereafter, I arrived home, safe though clearly not very sound. Despite my worst intentions, no one got hurt in the making of this movie, and the small caravan exited for their destination.

As I entered the apartment and took off my coat, I reached into my pocket and felt two little objects that were not where they should have been at that moment. I pulled out my phone and, in a deflated, quick burst spoke with my son in law one more time. 

"I have your daughter's gloves."