During a long car ride, one of our children complained that
their book had no plot. I wasn’t familiar with the story, so I asked how many
pages had been read. The answer: twelve. Once our stories stop flowing the way
we want, we like to jump in and control the process. We prefer skipping boring
parts, tossing aside bad sections, and boosting the excitement. When we overmanage
our stories, they turn out like this:
The video featured a perfect picture book with good doses
of drama and purpose sped up and ruined.We make that mistake with the stories we read and the story we live. We’d
like to skip the mad-sad-bad parts of life and keep the rest, but the mixture formed, and continues to form, us. What sentence summarizes the plot of your life story?
Whenever a major holiday coincides with trash pick-up, you
know what’s in store. Hoping it doesn’t take too long, you impatiently check
the receptacle several times while listening for any signs of the garbage truck.
And, if the trash stays at the curb past our deadline, this is our biggest
fear:
As the days tick by—and you’re fortunate—your receptacle will
hold all the trash you need to stuff in it. A late trash pick-up is like life.
We’ll tolerate a trashy situation for a while, but as soon as we’re fed up, we
want it to disappear. Once we reach our tipping point, it’s time to act. What
stinky situation are you ready to eliminate?
You haven’t been annoyed
until you’ve had to stop on a particular road in our town. See, we have a slew
of railroad tracks stretching across our community, but there’s one special track
spot you want to avoid. Here’s what happens: You’re zipping along on a sunny
summer day with the car windows rolled down. Suddenly, you hear the ding-ding of
the warning bell and see the red flashing lights signaling an oncoming train.
Of course, you stop the car as the train rumbles down the track. Lo and behold,
it’s not any ole train. No, it’s a freight train; the kind of train that
transports massive boxes of cereal, soaps, and soup. You shrug and figure you
won’t be there long. Wrong!
The train will slowly
lumber by while vehicles line up behind you. When the train pauses, you sigh and
wonder how much longer you’ll be there. You wait and wait and wait. About the
time you consider making a U-turn, the train begins moving again—only it goes backwards, retracing its tracks. And so,
you wait and watch the railroad cars you just saw heading right, go left as
they lumber back in the opposite direction.
Unfortunately, I’ve
lived through that train crossing at least three times. In fact, to my horror, we
approached it this week. The bell rang, the lights flashed, and if the
conductor had looked my way, he would have spotted me doing the famous Home Alone face. But, this time was different because within a minute the freight
train was gone. Annoying, but not the usual horrifying time. Sometimes, we just
have to grin and bear it. Speaking of bearing it, I betcha can’t watch this entire
video:
https://youtu.be/1V6N6kh4oOQ
Are you screaming yet? Don’t
buy a house in that community. When you’re especially annoyed, what keeps you
from resorting to the Home Alone face?
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Has the term “binge watching” made it into the dictionary yet?
It started when we recorded and watched multiple TV shows in one sitting, then it
grew in popularity when companies made entire seasons available for non-stop
viewing. Like other addictions, binge watching creeps up on you. At first, you’re
looking for a little entertainment or a way to relax after a hectic week. Four
hours later, you’re dazed and hooked on a show, forsaking restroom breaks and
phone calls.
At our house, we’re tracking several different shows. When Netflix
gives us ten seconds to answer that judgmental question, “Are you still watching?” We say, “is that a joke?
Yes, of course!” If you’re wondering why binge watching became a thing, here’s
one excuse:
https://youtu.be/8yDh6LzScrM
Despite having hundreds of cable stations, our family had
difficulty finding anything to watch on TV, at least nothing we all enjoyed.
Now, we can’t wait to see whether Emma or Cora reach the other side, or read
what happens next in our subtitled Korean suspense show—and thanks to Netflix—we
don’t have to. Patience and waiting—are these things of the past? Is there anything
you still don’t mind waiting for?
How
do you learn patience? Make a call using a rotary phone. It could take fifteen
seconds or more to complete a call on that ancient technology, which still took too long. Zeros took the longest
to dial, and our old phone number had two of them. Imagine dialing seven
numbers and hearing a rapid click-click-click-click after each one. I don’t
know how we stayed sane.
Typewriters
can teach lessons in patience, too. Every student old enough to submit a typed
school report should experience the typewriter, along with its correction tape
and messy white-out. For extra fun, remove the paper from the typewriter, then make
the correction. Best wishes in getting the paper and sentences to line up straight again.
Oh, the memories! Oh, the drudgery! Take a look at other contraptions that made
our lives better:
The
mom had the cassette ready, and she probably has a huge stash of tapes stored in
a closet. Remember how cassette tapes squeaked when they aged and unraveled if
you mishandled them? Even today’s technology can be frustrating once the
Internet connection shuts down. Sometime we learn the best lessons through our most
exasperating moments. What has helped you learn patience?
My
hidden talent may be one we all share. Whenever I approach a toll booth, I
manage to select the one with the longest line. The drivers in front of
me either ask for directions, pay with a large bill or I encounter the
“changing of the guards.” That’s when the toll taker turns off the green light
and goes home, leaving me stranded in a closed lane. As soon as I switch lanes,
the next shift comes onboard and turns the light from red back to green. Now
the first lane is open again! I know toll takers time their shift switches to trap me
in their long lines.
Maybe
I’m a little impatient, but aren’t we all? We’re certainly not wired for long
wait times in our gotta-have-it-now society. Take a look at how some people handle
long lines:
There’s
the proof. You don’t have to be grumpy while waiting in line, even if you’re waiting
outside in minus two degree (F) temperatures. Of course, it helps if you can wait
inside a sauna. The people in the Donald Driver line wanted to be there; they
had a choice. We get cranky when we’re forced to stand in line. A lack of
control raises our impatience meter.What are you waiting for and how well are you handling the wait?
