2004 Entries
2003 Entries
2002 Entries

2002-09-12 - 11:29 a.m.

Snips and snails and puppy dog tails are what little boys are made of, but Cyber Spiders, BIO Bugs and Hamtaro the Hamster are what they bring home in their pants pockets.

Little boys seem to have plenty of pocket paraphernalia. Whatever catches their eyes goes into their pockets. Sometime ago I rambled on about stuff--and we are a society of stuff--and most little fellas pack their pockets full of stuff. Little girls, though no less likely to gather up great little collectibles, are less likely to load up their pockets. They all seem to have bright-colored little purses to carry their stuff in.

These little people mirror the big people. Briefly, I considered asking some big boy people what they had in their pockets. Hm, no. For once, wisdom won out. I did once ask Bubba Peewee and, along with a Groucho Marx eyebrow wiggle, he showed me a little electronic bug zapper-I didn't ask--and a collapsible, battery-powered corkscrew.

As a kid I was a pocket packer. I shunned fancy little dresses in favor of blue jeans-weekends only, those were the days of dress codes and I had to reluctantly abide by the rules and wear a dress seven hours, five days a week. I didn't give two hoots and a holler for purses then and I don't now, so I crammed things in my jeans pockets, and Mom would later find all my goodies at the bottom of her washer. Although I no longer carry around lugnuts, jacks, odd shaped rocks or a rabbit's foot, I still jam things in my pockets. Every wash day a few pieces of spare change (I'm too lazy to put it back in my wallet or separate it out and put it in the change organizer in my car after my morning coffee ritual at McDonald's) fall into the washing machine barrel. Mostly, I fill my pockets with Kleenex. On laundry day I toss clothes in the washer, forgetting to clean out pockets, and more often than not I end up with clothes looking like they've been swished around in one of those little snow globes. A ranting, raving, kicking tantrum follows!

Much as I dislike it, I have given in to convention and I now carry a purse--well, I carry one unless I've mislaid it and can't find it. And I cram all sorts of interesting things in it. This morning, shoved in one pocket and mashing all the other good stuff at the bottom, I had the morning's USAToday, a Lands'End catalog and American Son, Richard Blow's account of JFK, Jr's days at George.

Further excavation unearthed: the greasy Ziplock bag from last Friday's roast beef sandwich; an empty Eto Gesic medicine bottle for BlueDoggy's arthritis; a waded up grocery list penned sometime in June; two small depleted tubes of Mary Kay "Satin Hands" lotion; seven loose Hall's cough drops; four Bic lighters, and a toothbrush with shabby bristles.

In the middle zippered pocket I found two bottles of high-priced, high-potency sinus drugs (I wondered where in hell those had gone) and my savings passbook (I also wondered where the money in the account had gone). The side zippered pocket produced a hair pick, calculator, spare car keys and a keychain of keys for the house previous to the one I now live in. Hm, suppose I should give those to the new owner. The small outer zippered pocket held a battered foil packet of Alka-Seltzer, another Bic lighter and a tube of Blistex.

A couple of years ago I got a bright idea. Organize the contents of my purse. I bought a small leather zippered pouch so I could keep things contained, i.e. not buried and smashed in the bottom of the purse. I have a medicated tube of Blistex, mechanical pencil and roller fine pen, travel size bottle of hair spray, five loose Tylenol and a nail file and clipper in the pouch. I don't know why the file and clippers. I bite my nails.

Okay, so a little more organization would help, but at least I've graduated from pocket packer to owner of a sloppy purse.

Previous -- Next