Finding Things

I'm not saying this sort of thing ever happens around here, but someone on the Well Trained Mind board posted a link to this funny post by the Country Doctor's Wife , which I am just copying and pasting in its entirety, since I know you are probably lazy like me and might not bother clicking on the link. All I'm saying is that I happen to live with 5 males as well . . .


"My dear friend, Mistah Zellah has often philosophized over the years, that the real reason women are able to find things more easily than men, is not because they are smarter, more determined, or one step higher on the evolutionary spectrum. Rather, it is because they have a uterus. He believes that it is the uterus that gives women the ability to exhaustively hunt for things.... to keep looking even when the first few spots do not pan out... to open doors... to look under beds... to empty drawers... to actually move a pillow or a pile of clothes or a sofa cushion to see if the missing object is located UNDERNEATH... to look behind the jackets on the hooks... to stoop... to bend... to move their necks from side to side during a search... to keep looking and keep looking and KEEP LOOKING until the lost item is found. He believes there is a yet to be discovered synapse, a muscle or a nerve ending that travels from the uterus to the brain that men do not have and this is why women can search, search, search and find and men can only briefly scan a room at eye level for a precious lost artifact before throwing their hands up in surrender. Living in a house of five males, I often wonder if Mistah Zellah could be right.

This weekend the Country Doctor and my son Drew were in a frantic fury trying to find a missing team basketball jersey. It is the exact same frantic fury that occurred the weekend before... and the weekend before that... and also the weekend before that. Before basketball season it was a football jersey... before football season it was a baseball cleat... etc, etc, etc. It is always a vital piece of sports equipment and it is always lost.

Actually, the item is not lost. It is just located slightly beyond their peripheral vision and that makes the missing item impossible for them to find.

I asked the Country Doctor what he would do if he could not immediately locate one of our sons in a convenience store, after filling up at a gas station in another town. I am positive that if the child did not materialize, directly in front of him, in a matter of seconds, the CD would decide that the kid was gone for good. He would run out to the car to tell me that one of our boys was lost, forever. I would jump out of the car, rush into the gas station, move my body slightly to the left, swivel my head ten degrees to the right and our child would instantly appear in front of me.

"How did you do that?" the CD would gasp.

"I used my EYEBALLS!!!!!!! You know THESE THINGS!" I would say, pointing to my eyes.

This evening, right in the middle of preparing dinner, I had to go pick up my eldest son from school.

"Ethan!" I hollered as I was leaving the house, "Chop up some carrots for the stir-fry while I am gone."

"Where are the carrots?" Ethan called out as I was walking out of the house.

"In the fridge... in one of the drawers..."

I knew I should have run back to the kitchen and set them out on the counter... but as the fridge only has TWO DRAWERS I thought SURELY HE CAN FIND THEM!!!!

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!!!!!!!

I came home to find my son standing in front of the fridge unable to locate the GIGANTIC BAG OF CARROTS IN THE DRAWER OF THE FRIDGE RIGHT IN FRONT OF HIS FACE!

After dinner, I announced that I would really appreciate it, if everyone could put their dishes in the dishwasher when they were finished with dinner. Immediately, I realized that I needed to give them a lot more information if I truly expected them to be able to FIND THE DISHWASHER!

"It is the rectangular silver appliance located in the kitchen," I explained, " You open the door and put your dishes inside."

The Country Doctor got up and stood in front of the fridge.

"You mean this one?" he asked opening up the fridge. "It has dishes in it."

"No... not that one... it is lower... you are going to have to bend over to find it."

The Country Doctor moved over and stood in front of the stove. "This one?" he asked. "It is silver and lower and it has a door..."

"No... but you are very close... turn around."

The Country Doctor turned around.

"This is a sink." he said.

"Yes, I know," I replied, " Move your body one step to the right and look down."

The Country Doctor followed my instructions and he found the dishwasher! At that moment, I looked at my four sons still seated at the table. I realized that watching their father find the dishwasher not ten feet from where they sat, did not improve the chances that they would also be able to find the dishwasher.

Suddenly, I discovered that I did not have the necessary strength to walk each one of my sons through the motions of locating the dishwasher. I was simply not strong enough to endure it. I felt weak and dizzy and sick to my stomach. If I kept this up... I was clearly going to perish. I wisely decided to admit defeat and live... for the sake of my future grandchildren... for the sake of my show cats... for the sake of the people who read my blog... I decided that teaching my four sons how to find the dishwasher was not the hill on which I would die.

I placed a feverish, shaking hand on my abdomen and thought about my uterus... my good old uterus... my helpful uterus. The same uterus that had sheltered all four of my boys... nourished them... cradled them... protected them The same uterus that clamped down and pushed them out when it was tired of them. I felt a shudder of pity sweep through me. Can the male species really be blamed for their inability to find things? After all, they are missing the vital organ that connects the brain to the eyeballs and allows the neck to swivel from side to side, which then causes the knees to bend and look underneath the stack of towels on the chiffarobe for that missing shoulder pad. They don't have a uterus! It is almost as if they were missing half their brains."