I'm sorry, I forgot

If I invite you over to watch a movie at my house, I'll likely get up to go into the kitchen to make popcorn and I'll ask you what you would like to drink.

"Diet Coke, please", you say, and I'll stroll off to the kitchen to start popping and pouring.

A little while later, final kernel popped, I'll come back into the living room. I'll place the popcorn on the coffee table but I won't give you your Diet Coke. Not because I'm a rude hostess or I just drank the last one myself. I won't give it to you because I've forgotten that I asked you if you wanted one.

I'm kind of like the Absent Minded Professor, only not that smart. Just so highly engrossed in my own world that I forget things almost after they've been told to me.

I can remember events from the first grade but I can't remember who I was supposed to follow up with after hanging up with my supervisor, who just told me who to follow up with. I've fooled people into thinking that I'm really efficient and complete tasks as soon as I'm given them. Not so. I'll just forget them if I wait an hour to get started.

If I stop at a gas station to get directions and it involves more than two turns in opposite directions, I'll just reiterate the first instruction, Okay, so I'll turn left out of this driveway and go for 2 miles, right? Then I'll stop at the next gas station I come to and ask the same question. Oh sure, I could write directions down, but my handwriting is so atrocious, even I can't read it.

I also lose things. Well, sometimes I just misplace them but they generally don't turn up until after I've already replaced them. I have 7 pairs of tweezers, 30 emery boards, 5 calculators and 3 hammers. I would only have 1 of each if I could have remembered where I put the first one.

I have three doors into my house: the front door, the side door and the door off the deck. My nightime ritual involves making sure that each door is locked and deadbolted. I check the windows and turn the backyard light on to make sure there isn't anyone lurking anywhere.

This morning, I woke up and was going to take Bernie for her walk. And I looked everywhere for my keys. I usually throw them somewhere when I walk in the door. They weren't on the hall table or the bookcase or the mantel or the dining room table or God forbid, the key hook.



This would be improper use of a security system.