All Things to All People

I have a weakness.

My weakness is there’s some small part of me that is convinced that I am a Super Shero, that I can be All Things to All People, and that if I just organize my day properly I can Do! All! the Things! Spoiler alert: this is often not the case. Still, my belief in myself remains unflagging.

Take a random Tuesday in August; I have promised my neighbor to go exercise with her first thing in the a.m.. I have also made tentative plans to go see my cousin Jill and her daughter Gracie when they arrive from out of state to settle Gracie in for her final semester at Lewis and Clark College. Maybe we’ll have lunch, maybe dinner, who knows, but it’s a plan.

 Planish. 

Plan adjacent. We’ll figure it out.

Gracie, Jill and I--we figured it out. 

On my way to Portland, I might as well swing north to Napavine—I mean, it’s RIGHT THERE—kiss my grandkids, and deliver fair tickets to my kiddos—why do I have fair tickets, you might ask? It’s a long story, no need to digress. Let’s just keep focused on how many birds I am menacing with this single stone.

The other bird is that Mark is suddenly dispatched to California—sudden as in Sunday he got the call—to help oversee the safety and quality assurance of a railroad bridge that was destroyed in the Dixie fire in what once was Greenville, California. Since I’m going to be in Portland anyway, I might as well swing by, drop him off at the airport, kiss-kiss, be careful, and be on my way. Then a quick stop at Costco for—well, for whatever random goodness appeals, to be honest.

Did I mention that lunch is on the I-5 side, and the airport is on the 205 side, and traffic at anytime of day is the stuff of nightmares? Also, I might have been up since 4:30 a.m. working out the logistics?

All of the aforementioned explains why—at 5 p.m. on a random Tuesday-- I am climbing into the trunk of my car in the Vancouver parking lot of Costco. 

I lay down. 

I really, really need caffeine.