I have the bad habit of putting trash and other odds and ends in places they don’t belong: on the kitchen counter, on my bureau, on the dining room table as I’m flying out the door with the kids, in my extra-large plum and burnt orange LL Bean tote bag I haul around, and on the floor of my minivan on the way to my kids’ various activities. And while the little voice inside my head assures me this is only a temporary solution — come on, I’m busy, I’ll throw/put that away as soon as I am done with (insert some inane activity here), I promise — I consistently find that at least once a week, I am completely disgusted with my behavior. But the absolute worst place I can stick my hand into is my coat pockets. Here is where I find the weirdest collection of…things. Seriously, I could have my own reality show. Sort of like Hoarders. But where the experts storm into my house and start ripping coats out of my closet and emptying my pockets and shouting desperately in my face, “See! See what you have become!”
Anyhoo. The following is a list, in no particular order (okay, there is an order) of things I have recently discovered in my coat pockets. I assure you that what you are about to read is real.
– Two rusty screws and a rusty nail.
– A small piece of jagged plastic, origin unknown.
– Loose change covered in an unknown sticky substance.
– Baby nail clippers.
– A bottle cap.
– A Market Basket pink deli counter ticket.
– A gum wrapper covering a chewed morsel of an unidentified food, most likely spit forth from the mouth of a child.
– Eyebrow tweezers
– Used baby wipes (not diaper related).
– Stiff balls of dirty facial tissues.
– A purple pompom.
– Several Bobby pins, a paperclip and a rubberband.
– A small pile of crumbs — remnants of three or more unfinished snacks, which probably include Goldfish, a Kashi cereal bar and toddler Mum Mums.
– Receipts, napkins and straw wrappers, all from Dunkin’ Donuts.
– A Matchbox car.
– Plastic backings to some sort of sticker, usually the orange dots from Market Basket.
– A sock.
– A thimble-sized bottle of Walgreens hand sanitizer.
– A “Free Slice” card from Upper Crust Pizza
– A “crystal” (a white rock my son found in the yard)
– Two used Q-tips.
(TMI? Sorry! Sometimes my son’s personal hygiene takes place on the way to the bus stop. Apparently we do a lot of our personal upkeep on the go.)
