Deconstructing the things in my pocket

I use to be the kind of the guy that carried useful things in his pockets. Need a band aid? I got you covered. Can't find something in dark? Cool, I got a LED light on my keychain. It has a bottle opener and a knife as well, so no worries getting that bottle of Stella opened. Lighter, check. Pen, check. Gum...C'mon give me a challenge. Yessir, I was like MacGyver, minus that sad, sad haircut.

And it was a point of pride for me. Ask people who know me, I was useful. I was good to have around. I could be relied upon in pinch.

Then I had a kid...

Now instead of MacGyver with a cool do, I'm that guy that spends five minuets finding a buck fifty for a cup of coffee while sheepishly apologizing to the people standing cross armed behind me, tapping their feet in a caffeine deprived rage. I hate that guy. How did I become that guy? Seriously, how? I use to have it all together, pocket wise that is.

Don't believe me? Think I'm exaggerating. Let's have a look at the contents of my pockets right now. The first things I pull out of my pocket are pretty predictable. Car keys, pocketknife/bottle opener, flashlight. All the things that add to my mystic and reputation as a useful guy. However, things get kind of weird after that.

A screw...? A screw?! Why the hell do I have a screw in my pocket...oh right, I took it from Abby when she was about to eat it.

A piece of wire? see above. On a side note, why are there random pieces of wire laying around my house anyway?

And more tissue than anyone person has a right to have on them at any one time. This one is kind of reasonable, I mean kids have snotty noses. You wipe their nose, tuck the tissue in your pocket, look back at the kid to make sure their okay and...Seriously, I just wiped your nose c’mon man! It's like the wait until just after you wipe their noses and turn away that they give the ol' sniffer a good cleaning. I try to reduce paper waste as much as possible, but I have enough tissue in my pockets to...to…well, I can't think of a cool tissue metaphor here, but it's a lot.

Anyway, I digress. The next thing in my pocket is not one, not two but three hair elastics. This is interesting for a couple of reasons. The least of which is not the fact that I have had the same buzz cut hairstyle for the past eight years. I can't even pinch my hair to pull, but I got three hair elastics on me because...and that's just it, I have no idea why. They just sort of appear.

Oh look, a leaf. I'm not kidding. I'm a 35 year old man walking around town with a leaf in my pocket. A Lego piece, a piece of soap, some string and a random bottle top round out the treasure chest that has become my pants. Thank god I'm not a woman. I’m not being misogynistic either. Can you imagine how worse it would be if I had to carry a purse. I'm not sure, but I would imagine the average mom is lugging around 20-25 pounds of absolute crap at any given point of time. Most of that being used tissue.

I suppose it's the gig. I mean you take something away from them and they scream until it's out of sight. So you put it in the magic black hole that is your pocket and they move on to the next thing that may or may not be edible and...Are you serious, look at your nose...I just wiped your nose a second ago.

It’s just that fast, you’ve completely forgotten about what you just put in your pocket and you then bury it under another piece of tissue. Forgotten until you order a double, double and then have to apologize to strangers with a shrug of you shoulders and a stupid grin.

Take my advice and buy yourself a good pair of cargo pants.