The Great Toothpaste Caper

OK. . .here is the first repost from the, ahem, other blog "space". This is one of my faves. . .although it's a little long. Pretty much sums up the crazyland that is my house in Austin. Let me know if you can relate!

The Great Toothpaste Caper, October 16, 2008

Yesterday morning I had what might have been my first "senior moment". I'm only 32, er. . 31. (Was that another one?). I could write a whole other diatribe about how silly I used to think people were when they acted like they can't remember how old they are. But now I too have joined that crowd. Unless it's a milestone you can forget it. But anyway, back to the state of my distracted mind.

Yesterday I lost a brand new tube of toothpaste between my downstairs kitchen and my upstairs bathroom. Seriously. I went out to the car to get the toothpaste because it was still in there from the weekend when I made a special trip to the store to get it. I apparently needed it so much that it got to sit in my car all weekend. So, yesterday (Tuesday) I could squeeze no more out of the old tube and decided to hike down the stairs, into the garage, and into the abyss of my kid friendly back seat—(that's code for a reeking mess of cookie crumbs, toys, art projects, pajamas, and in this case a long-lost tube of toothpaste).

Triumphantly I pranced back into the house just as Indiana Jones (with whom my son is obsessed) escaped across the screen with some lost artifact. Poetic? I vote Yes. And in that moment, while watching my son pretend to be Indy, acting out the poison dart booby trap scene with more precision than a four-year old has the right too, I LOST THE BLESSED TOOTHPASTE! Indy would be so disappointed. I couldn't even blame it on Bellock.

By that point I was upstairs but with no toothpaste in hand. I remembered throwing away the grocery store bag that the toothpaste came in. Did I throw the stupid toothpaste away too? I went downstairs and looked in the trash. I looked on the kitchen table and even in the backseat of my car—again. Nope. I went upstairs and looked in the other bathroom where I'd just dried my hair. Nope. I looked in my own bathroom again—carefully this time. Nope. I asked my husband if he saw me put it down anywhere. "Nope." (Standard answer-don't know why I even ask). The sad part was that I KNEW it would show up later in a very obvious spot. I knew I was overlooking it and I didn't have the where-with-all to conduct a more careful search.

The only other time that I remember being that distracted was in the week leading up to my wedding. I spent a good minute and a half trying to rub off nail polish with Hydrogen Peroxide—cussing the whole time about why it wasn't working. That same week I managed to get out of the shower having shaved only one leg. But that was understandable because I was planning a wedding, working full-time, etc. (Actually in hindsight it was nothing compared to the three-ring circus I've created for myself now, but you can't tell a 23 year old anything).

Anyway, as you might imagine the toothpaste was in the cardboard package on the bathroom counter beside the sink where I brush my teeth every morning. Really. I called myself looking for it and really couldn't find it. In coming in from the garage I apparently bolted up the stairs and back down without remembering that I had done so. Really. There is no telling what called me back downstairs. Perhaps Indiana Tucker was about to bullwhip the cat into submission. Just another day in the Davis house.

It just goes to show how much we change. When I was young and I couldn't find something my mom would say, "Ok but if I have to come in there and find it you're going to be sorry." And now, I think, "God please let my mother move down here and take care of my sorry self before I Hydrogen Peroxide my teeth and try to shave one leg with nail polish remover while I rub off the nail polish with the toothpaste just for grins!" Amen.