This morning, our 8-year-old son Sam approached me very worried. These days most things worry Sam. Lost papers. Getting to school on-time. Kirby the Beagle’s constant whereabouts (usually running around pell-mell outside). It’s just a phase, but a worry filled one for him. Well, this morning, it was his closet that was worrying him. Yes, Sam’s younger brother Ben had made a mess of their shared closet and this bothered Sam greatly. He needed help addressing it. Urgent help. Cleaning the closet. 15 minutes before it was time to head out for school.
Grumbly, I headed upstairs. As I helped clean the closet, I grumbled. As I convinced them that a deflated balloon was not worth saving, I grumbled. As I scooped up toys and barked cleaning directions, I grumbled. In short, we cleaned the closet, but I was very grumbly.
Getting to work, I settled into my cubicle. My cubicle that happens to be a mess. Car counters, here (don’t ask). Boat plugs, there (don’t ask). Stacks of paper abounding. Post-It Note style wallpaper. I won’t even get started on the shovel propped up in the corner. It was one of those types of weeks. Best of all, I had a prototype for a series of aquatic invasive species monitoring plates hanging from my coat hook, which also held my sports jacket. A shared hook hosting all manner of devices and outerwear. My cubicle was a mess.
Given this small world of chaos, I felt a sudden urge to run to the copier. Maybe a fight or flight type response. Similar actions to those of a squirrel darting back and forth in the middle of the street. I was a mess, just like my cubicle. Well, I performed that sudden bolt toward the copier and ran straight into a very pointy corner on the hanging prototype monitoring plates. The monitoring plates made out of an old windshield (oh, I failed to mention that. A very pointy old piece of a windshield). Like I said, with very pointy corners. Right into my outer thigh. That very pointiness hurt very bad. So bad I considered hiking up my pant leg to take a look. I did not. “Thankfully,” says all of those working in close proximity to me.
Suspended monitoring plates. Don’t ask, just note their “pointiness.” Fleshy thigh + pointy corner = ouch!
In pain and sitting down in my rat’s nest of a workspace, I reflected on some cleaning that needed to be done and now seemed very urgent. Maybe I had been too rough on my assessment of Sam’s messy closet. Maybe it was in need of urgent cleaning. Perhaps, but I knew one thing. My grumbliness had been replaced with pain. Pure pain. Paybacks are indeed Hell. A very pointy, pain inducing form of Hell.