It's been a Good Gary Day

I wrote a note on my hand today for the first time in years. I really wanted to ask my therapist a question and knew in the rush and routine of our regular visit I would forget it, so I scribbled it on my hand in the car. I used to write notes on the back of my hand all the time in high school and college. PDAs either didn't exist or weighed more like stone tablets so I didn't have a good way to send electronic reminders back then. The Treo phone worked well for a while or I just became compulsive enough to remember everything without any prompting. But old age is starting to set in and life continues to get more and more complicated each year so I need a little help.

I have reminders on my phone for recycling day and when to give the dogs heartworm pills, but it's not ideal for everything, so in my haste today I went old school. I felt nostalgic and calm looking at my graphitti'ed hand as though even writing down the subject cleared it from my brain's cache. But the good feeling could have just been from going to my therapist in the first place.

It's only 50 minutes every two weeks but Gary has a genuine interest in my well being and isn't intimately connected to me personally or professionally. I make lists of topics to cover either in my head or on the iPhone and sometimes even the list itself gets the ball rolling of prioritizing my concerns. When I first started going (wow, six years ago!) I had to cover items in chronological order but today I was all over the place. I could survive without going to Gary but we both enjoy our hour together. I think he enjoys listening to my wacky antics and I enjoy getting an hour to myself every two weeks.

But after that hour passes the day races on. The hand-written reminder is fading off my hand, I'm late for a meeting, my in box is full of "action items," Rich and I have to high-tail it to Richmond for dinner with the in-laws, and the dog shit all over the rug with diarrhea for unknown causes. It's just another day in Paradise. Rich always asks if I "had good Gary" when I get back and the answer is almost always yes.