Enough Already?

When is enough enough?

Like why do the Rolling Stones still tour? They are old. Rock and roll should not be performed by the AARP set. Charlie Watts looks like he has no teeth. Keith Richards looks like he has been embalmed. And no matter how good he looks FOR HIS AGE, we don't need to see Mick strut around like a tough rooster. I have heard people say that they want to see them before they die.

Like why did Lucas-Spielberg-Ford do another Indiana Jones flick? Yeah, it was great to see the silhouetted Harrison Ford put on that famous hat, but a weak script, mediocre story and caricatures instead of characters couldn't save this clunker of a movie.

Like what did the final two seasons with the Washington Wizards do for Michael Jordan, the Wizards or basketball? Not a thing. Coming off of his second retirement, His Airness was hurt and his step and shot had lost their zip. He did not take the team to the playoffs or burnish his image.

Like thinking that you should have cheaper gas so you can continue driving your anachronistic SUV--or a Lincoln Mark V? And Detroit, the home of the gas guzzler, wonders why it can't sell cars. Unnecessarily large inefficient vehicles became a bad idea in the 70's, why would anyone be surprised that the reprise would be a repeat?

Like listening exclusively to the oldies station and saying that they don't make decent music anymore. Like complaining that teens on social network sites don't have real relationships. Like trying to recreate your childhood for your children. Like doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results.

Me? I still gotta lot to learn. I'm not ready to stand still.

Doing What?

Well, I have been quite remiss in my entries of late. And I figured out why.

Too much doing, and not enough thinking.

Doing what? Like driving. Back and forth. To work and school. Dropping off at practice. Picking up at practice. Oh, and the drive-thrus.

Doing what else? Like talking on the phone. I don't even know what about. I know that I shouldn't talk while I am driving, but it has become mutually inclusive. And rest assured there is no thought going into these conversations.

Doing what else? Like furrowing my brow. There has been a bunch of brow furrowing going on for the past few months. Again, not a thoughtful kind of furrowing. Just that just below a boil worry. No great breakthroughs, because that would have meant there was some thinking.

Doing anything else? I will be damned if I could identify effective use of my non-thinking time. It seems like I am in a whirlwind of activity, yet little to show.

I think--hey! that's a good start--that I will work to be a little more mindful. Using my mind rather than losing my mind. That feels better already.

Time Free Zone

The 11-year old: Can I please play RTC on the computer?
Me: No.
Him: Would it help if I said please?
Me: (lying) No.
Him: Please?
Me: Well I don't want you in front of that computer all night. You can play until 6:15.
Him: Great!
Me: Now you need to be able to tell time. To time yourself. I don't want to have to come in there at like, seven and tell you to get off. Understand?
Him: No problem.
Me: (at 7 p.m.) Get off!

Happens every time. Like clockwork. Well at least something has to do with time.

Time Bound

Today, for Father's Day the 11-year-old composed a most delicious breakfast of eggs and toast with a side of ham. And quite a good meal it was. He not only planned and prepared the meal, but also plated and served. Presentation IS everything.

I had a drink with a friend on Friday who shared some photos of her beloveds from an professional photo shoot. She wanted to capture in film the moments that she sees as a mom. No phony canned expressions of a traditional portrait. The pics were great--her babes are 9 and 6.

I got to thinking about the pics we have of the kids at different ages. Now that the 14-year-old is man-sized, seeing pictures of him as a 3rd grader doesn't connect with his current being. We were listening to a recording of him from two summers ago--from before he started singing at a register so low that only dogs can hear. The voice on the recording didn't belong to my son.

Then I started thinking of my own mom. In her head I am still in high-school. She talks about things that I "like" that I haven't actually liked in say, oh, 20 years?

You can't freeze time. You can remember the past. But what and who we were, isn't what and who we are. I used to hold both of the 14-year-old's feet in my one hand. I can't get my hands around one of his size 13 sneakers. I used to poke the 11-year-old in his squishy, baby belly and receive the most beautiful tinkles and bubbles of his baby giggles. Now, his belly laughs come from deeper in his belly--some day soon to come from a lower octave.

Capturing a moment or an afternoon in film can help to loose up a memory at a later time. Reconciling that moment to the person, though, gets harder and harder.

House As Locker

Today is my first day off in 19 days. Yes, that is 19 days straight working, most days 11 or 12 hours long. (Some longer, a few shorter.) So, you say, "What do you have to THINK about that, Doc?"

Well, here is what has happened. My house has turned into a locker. Not a locker room, mind you. But simply a locker. It is a place that we drop things off, on the way to the next thing. It is not a destination, but a storage spot.

At Target at back-to-school time, you can find mirrors and little storage thing-ees that facilitate using your locker. We don't use them here. No-SIR-ee.

Our locker is for backpacks, briefcases, clothes (usually plucked from baskets or tossed dirty, willy-nilly), blackberries and phones to recharge, shoes, football uniforms, and piles of mail (which likely include bills). Any food items are to grab and go. One difference is that we sleep in the locker. But it isn't for comfort, just practicality.

This week included multiple football practices, an evening (okay NIGHT) in the emergency room with a broken hand, big dance, two tests, multiple quizzes, and like a thousand and fifty hours on the telephone and e-mail on Hurricane Katrina, oh, and let' s not forget the calls not made to check in on the post-lung cancer operative Dad (doing great), and newly jaundiced mom-in-law (TBD). Whew!

Tonight, we had dinner at the table. It was such a treat that the sixth-grader insisted on candles. It was a special occasion.

The same, said, sixth-grader brought up (in a confused movie reference) the John Bloorman movie Hope and Glory. The movie chronicles a young family during the WWII Blitz in London, and how the family (mostly young son) coped most excellently.

So, maybe life with house as locker isn't as damaging as I thought. Or maybe the plates filled with a meal cooked on the stove in the locker and the candles on the locker table were a welcome relief.

Maybe (I think) the locker might have been transformed back into a home.

ADD and Kids

I think that I might be borderline ADD. I present many of the behaviors. I have been very lucky to have professionally partnered with people who have balanced my mile-a-minute idea factory with their more structured (read SANER) approaches. This combo has allowed projects to be successfully completed. Completed! Us borderline ADD's don't really care about the completion part, but my boss sure does.

For those who know the Myers-Briggs or the Kiersey temperament Sorter, I am ENTP, and when you look at the traits, you can see why I am borderline ADD. My personality type is clever, but bores easily and has more fun coming up with the solution than actually implementing it. I hate work in cycles--once I have been through the cycle I don't need to do it again! So it's on to the next idea, next project, next fun. Oh, and I love a good debate and don't mean to hurt your feelings as I shred your argument. I might even agree with you, but the fight's the thing.

Oddly, the popular coping mechanism for ADD folks is to create a grid, label it with chunks of time, then fill in the chunks with tasks. They call it time management [Warning, this link is a PDF]. Then all I have to do is complete the work as presented in the grid. Now WHO THE HELL THINKS I CAN DO THAT? Here is what really happens.

1. I am VERY excited researching and learning about this technique


2. Day one, I create the grid


3. Day one, I follow the model and complete many tasks


4. Day two, I make the grid, but don't fill it all the way in


5. Day two, I do some of the items, but also a few things not on the list


6. Day three, I am so bored with this technique. I did this damn thing already.


7. I toss this process aside and go back to my normal scramble.

What are those psychologists thinking? The whole point is I don't like (hate!) doing rote things, so the solution is to do rote things? Sigh. What was it Einstein said about insanity?

I think that the best "job" for us ADD folks is to be parents. Being a parent means being in constant flux. As soon as you think you know what your kid is up to, they enter a new "phase" and all bets are off. New things to figure out for the ADD-addled. Then you go really crazy and add a second child to the mix. You find out that this one is wired totally differently. You can jump back and forth between the friends, problems, activities, joys of two (or more?) of your homegrown issue-generators.

Like my kids are far from opposites, but they perceive and react to the world according to their own personalities. It's just like they were people! [uh, don't take that wrong kids. It was a little funny, wasn't it? Was I being insensitive again?]