LET'S PRETEND - Segment 3 (Scroll down for earlier segments)

     I once mowed my entire yard several times in search of my favorite hammer.  The yard began to look like a putting green. There was still no hammer. I became suspicious.  While I was in the garage, I noticed someone had been tampering with the lid on my old, unused toolbox.  Throwing the lid open, I was shocked at what I found.  There, in plain sight, was my hammer.  “Why isn’t this in the yard,” I asked my son, “in the high grass where it won’t get lost?”

     “Sorry, Dad,” he said, “I thought I had left it in the yard, but I guess I forgot and mistakenly put it in the toolbox.  I’ll try not to do it again.”

     He was usually very good about leaving things out, but he probably had other things on his mind, and just forgot.  Just as a precaution, I put a deadbolt lock on the toolbox.  If any organized person got into it, it would be lost forever.

     I now have posted in the garage, the saying of a wise man…”Chaos(I like to call it ’Alternative Order’) means never storing your tools in an obvious place.”  Whether he was wise, or not, I don’t know.  But he probably had his own tools at one time.

     It’s okay to read about highly effective, organized people as a matter of humorous reading, but don’t try to be like them.  Order will not make you happy.  Sure, it makes them happy as they go straight to a file drawer and pull out important legal papers.  But that isn’t you.  You’re more comfortable looking for important documents under the bed, behind a five hundred pound bookcase, in the garbage, under the driver’s seat in your car; that is you.  Alternative Order is your comfort zone.  Being organized would make you a miserable wretch.

     But be alert!  There are people lurking nearby that want to organize your life; to turn make-believe into reality.   Just today my own wife, forgetting about past failures, made another attempt to bring order to my life.  She bought me a monthly planner.  It was one that I didn’t have, so I put it with my collection.  For those who collect them, it is a very nice gift.  I have attended several monthly planner trade shows, where people from all across the United States meet to display and trade planners.  It’s very much like a stamp show.  If you trade, always make sure there is no writing inside.  That devalues them.  My greatest find was a monthly planner on a stone tablet.

 

    She also told me about someone in our area who could come in and organize our garage.  “They will create storage where there is no storage,” she said.

     “Frankly, I don’t know what’s so great about that,” I told her.  “I’ve done the same thing for years, and it was free!”

To be continued...check back soon