Focus

I know everyone has a thing or two that distracts them.. grabs their attention no matter what is going on and makes them lose their focus on what they were doing. Some event that triggers a memory maybe. Say you are walking out to the mailbox to get your mail and you notice a hot woman out for a jog and suddenly you are mezmerized by the bouncing... and you think back to the early days of Baywatch and the opening credits which was really nothing but a T&A show with hot women in swimsuits running down the beach. Ahh.. the sweet memories of adolescense. A minute later you are standing perplexed in your driveway wondering what happened and why you are outside in the first place.

It's all about focus. Can you manage to get through your task at hand without falling victim to the distractions around you. Or if you do get sidetracked, do you have a way of getting back to the original task quickly and efficiently? For my boys, the answer to those questions is an emphatic NO. Nuh-uh. Nope. Not a chance.

My son's being the overworked child labor force they are, have a couple chores. One does dishes for the week and the other has a couple minor things like refilling the water bottles (yes I'm cheap and refill water bottles) and making ice. Tough stuff. As they are off for the summer, this stuff is all supposed to be done during the day. Before I get home. Its actually supposed to get done before they sit down to be lazy for the day. Thats the theory anyway.

So yesterday I get home from work and there is my younger son standing in the kitchen filling the few water bottles that needed it. He is about halfway done.. has a few filled and about 3 to go. The water is running. I see that he is doing what should be done already, but I let it go and ask him to get the mail and pick up his shoes when he is done. He says OK.

5 minutes later I come out of my bedroom having gotten changed to go to the gym.. and there is said child sitting at the computer with his headphones on, listening to music and playing some flash based game on the net. I call him 3 times in a progressively louder voice until such time as I have outdone the volume on the headphones. He looks at me with that "What now Dad?" expression. I ask him why he is on the computer and what did he forget to do? He thinks for a minute, looks around for a clue and grabs his shoes and goes around the corner and tosses them into his room from the doorway. After which he promptly sits down again and goes back to playing.

Again I have to get his attention. "G! What ELSE did you not do yet?" He thinks again.. and the lightbulb turns on. He runs out to the mailbox and gets the mail and brings it back and tosses it on the counter. He looks at me with the "Is that all?" look for a minute and when I don't say anything. He sits back down and gets comfortable and starts playing.

Now I could have said something when he was looking at me with the 'is that all' look, but honestly I was irritated enough at that point that I invoked the parents right to be obnoxious and make life as annoying as possible for their children who have irritated them so. I get his attention for the third time and make him get up. I steer him into the kitchen where the water is still running. Where the water bottles are in the same state of half filled as they were when I walked in the door. I point to them and he remembers again! He proceeds to finish this 90 second long job of filling the 5 water bottles that were on the counter and puts them back in the fridge.

He starts back for the computer again, but I have to know. Which time was it when I dropped him as a baby that caused this kind of short term memory damage? I ask him why he didn't finish any of the items I asked him to do AFTER he finished water bottles. He said he had to go to the bathroom and that when he came out he forgot about the other things. So did the flowing water he was using to fill the bottles distract him with a sudden need to make his own personal waterfall? Maybe the better question is.. did the data that was cached in his short term memory get removed via this waterfall and flushed? Is the bathroom some kind of mind altering portal? One has to wonder.

This is a common occurence. The computer, the TV, the Xbox, music, the thought of dessert, a comment from a sibling. Any of these and more can wipe their heads clean of any current task and change their focus. My older son was mowing the lawn yesterday. He came and I asked if he was done. He told me he wasn't and that he just wanted a drink of water quick. So he got his drink. About 10 minutes later I go out to the kitchen for some water myself.. and there he is standing with his hand on the garage door ready to go back out.. apparently unable to do so as his brain has been sucked in by the Star Wars movie that his brother is watching. Maybe that tractor beam they use in Star Wars movies works on the brains of children as well. He was like a deer in headlights. Transfixed.. seemingly unable to move. I had to get his attention to break the enchantment.

I suppose we all have our distractions.. the things that take us away from real life. Maybe that is what growing up is about? Learning how to get things done despite the distractions. Getting things done that need to be done despite the fact that we would rather just sit and watch some TV and forget about all that stuff looming over our heads like a piano being suspended with dental floss.

I don't want to grow up.. I'm a Toys 'R' Us kid.

I leave you with a video, because unlike my slacker siblings, I like to enrich your lives with more than just my eloquent and poingnant prose. So let the enriching begin!



Mmmmm.. Yasmin. I don't know about you.. but I feel enriched!