Multi-tasking is not my forte. Planning out multi-tasking is, but actually
accomplishing it all, that's another story entirely. Right now I am sitting in a giant mess of
multi-tasking. Yup, one big pile of …
multi-tasking.
It all starts with the Christmas decorations. I get halfway through when I realize that I
cannot find the tree skirt. I go back to
the basement looking for possibly one more box that I may have missed. That's when I notice that there are many
things that need to be reorganized down there, like some recent storage
deliveries my daughter has dropped by.
She is working and going to school at the same time, so her stuff is a
little willy-nilly, and it seems like it needs to be repacked and better
protected from basement-like elements. So I take time out of my current task, finding
the tree skirt and finishing the decorating, to reorganize her things and get
them to a better location. Right now
there are several items of hers, all repacked and safely covered from the
elements, just waiting to leave my den and go back into the depths of the stone
cellar.
I still have not located the tree skirt. But I have located the card table I believe
would go well in the semi-organized spare room.
I haul it out of its hiding space near the hot water heater, clean it of
cobwebs, and set it up as Santa's Makeshift Workshop up in the boonies under
the rafters where I am trying to set up an office (also partially done). I clean off a couple of chairs and take a few
hours away from what I am doing (organizing my daughter's stuff and searching
for the tree skirt so I can finish setting up the Christmas decorations) to
wrap the random gifts and stocking stuffers that I have already purchased. This leads me to making a list of what I
still need to buy.
After I get most of the gifts wrapped (those I have - there
are still dozens I need to purchase), I start laundry so my college kid can
return to school with clean clothes rather than the duffle full of filthy ones
he brought home with him. Since the
laundry is in the basement, I decide to continue looking for the tree
skirt. Instead I locate candles and
realize that I haven't purchased the Advent candles for the wreath. I start tearing apart the three boxes of
candles -- one with the tapers, one with the tea light and votives, and one
with the candle holders. It suddenly
seems terribly important to take stock of what I have and what I need for the
Christmas season. So now these boxes
come upstairs and sit in the den along with my daughter's stuff that has been
repacked and needs to go back down again.
After the first load of laundry is done, I have an
appointment for the car to get serviced.
It doesn't really need that oil change just yet, but it's running a
little rough, so I have the oil changed anyway, the air filter checked, and
have a few other things taken care of.
The car and I will be traveling quite a bit come college lacrosse
season, so I want to make sure it's in good shape before the cold weather sets
in too deeply. I take a magazine, two puzzles,
and my newly-created holiday shopping list with me. If I'm going to be sitting there for a while,
I don't want to waste time reading about the latest Hollywood scandals or the
election fall-out. I manage to get
through an entire issue of Boston Magazine (that is actually two months old
because I am too busy multi-tasking to read it before now), start a puzzle, and
glance at my list. I make a mental note
that I should also be looking to buy a new tree skirt as I still have not found
the other one.
After the car is done, I hit Small Business Saturday, which
is lame so I buy nothing except stuff I need at CVS (which is the antithesis of
a small business), and briefly consider grabbing the camera and photographing
my sons' high school alumni lacrosse game.
When I realize the game is outside on the windy and cold turf, I change
my mind and take my future daughter-in-law with me to Pier One, where I buy
pillows that are on sale and don't really match the living room, so I think
I'll put them in the den where they sort of match better. I have to move stuff off the couch, stuff
that includes wrapped presents, to see if the pillows look good. I start to put the wrapped presents under the
tree then remember that I can't do that yet because I still haven't found the
damn missing tree skirt.
It seems like it must be just about supper time, so I
scrounge around the refrigerator for the last of the Thanksgiving leftovers
from my sister and brother-in-law's feast.
I realize that I don't have any gravy made, so I grab a packet of gravy
that I keep handy. When I grab one,
several fall down. I get distracted
cleaning out the cabinet and discovering that only one of the six packages of
gravy is even still near date. I cook
that up while microwaving the leftovers and go through another magazine so I'm
at least up to November now with the reading.
Then I remember that it's Saturday, and I haven't checked the mail, so I
go to the mailbox and … surprise … there's another magazine there. I put it on the pile with other unread
periodicals and as I fuss about in the living room, I remember, Oh yeah, I really need to find that flippin'
tree skirt.
Now I'm writing the blog, with a pile of post-lacrosse
laundry at my feet waiting to go into the washing machine, several boxes and
bags waiting to go back into the basement (along with a cooler from
Thanksgiving that needs to be put away), a bag of gifts waiting to go upstairs
to Santa's Workshop, dishes from my leftovers waiting to go into the
dishwasher, new pillows that are ready and waiting to be de-tagged, magazines
that need to be sorted and read, Advent candles that are waiting for the wreath
(which I also mysteriously cannot locate), Christmas boxes that need to be
unpacked, and, damnitall, I still have yet to find that motherf***ing
tree skirt that started this whole mess in the first place.
I finally get the last load of clothes into the washing
machine, and I start bringing stuff from the den back into the basement. I notice that son #1 left his lacrosse bag on
the cement floor (bad idea) and way too close to the semi-functional and
extremely dysfunctional furnace (worse idea).
I begrudgingly pick up the large sports bag, go to put it on top of the
container of extra sporting equipment when I notice under the helmets…a ….
box. A brown box. A brown cardboard box with my handwriting on
it.
Oh … my … god … could
it be?!
I bring the box upstairs and tear it open. Inside I find first the wire base for the
Advent wreath. Then I find the faux
green wreath that goes over the base into which the candles go (which I need by
next Sunday because that's the first week of Advent). I unwrap a few old-fashioned Saint Nicholas
figurines that I now realize were also missing. And the stockings. DOH!
Can't have Christmas without stockings to fill. Then I find the small red velveteen tree mini-skirt
that goes around the three-foot tree that I haven't set up in years, and I
think, "Well, thankfully I can use that one since I can't seem to … find …
the …
Suddenly I hear the voices of angels. I hear coronets and bells. I hear the sound of my own skull cracking
open because I can finally stop worrying and obsessing. In the last bag in the last box found in a
place that makes no sense whatsoever as the sporting equipment is clear across
the basement from where everything else is and always has been neatly stacked
on shelves every Christmas since I started living in this house, I find
it.
The tree skirt.
The official, full-sized, wrap-it-around-a-six-foot-tree tree
skirt. The quilted, decades-old
tree skirt for the Christmas tree that is now fully decorated and lit up just
waiting for the gifts to be piled under it, has finally made its
appearance. And it's all because of my
terrible and completely mish-mashed multi-tasking. It may not be my forte, but it sure does add
excitement to the chaos that is my life.
Merry Christmas Season to all. Now let the games begin.
