Day 1
This week started out wrong and it's only going to get ... wronger. Or something. I had to turn down leftover pizza for breakfast and that's so foreign to me that I'm off my game.
You see, breakfast, lunch, dinner--to me, pizza is good anytime. It's the food world's duct tape.
But as of Monday morning, I'm embracing the first of seven straight Opposite Days. So my first instinct to eat pizza had to be rejected, and I had to try Linda's healthy stuff.
Sometimes I swear she's eating rocks and dirt from our garden, but she says it's granola.
I opened the cereal closet and discovered something called Heart to Heart. Never heard of it,
didn't even know we had it in the house, but I remember liking it as a 1980s TV show."Nothing artificial," the box proclaims, and my insides groan in disappointment.
Phil Handwerk, a loyal reader, came up with the idea of Opposite Week as an homage to the Seinfeld episode where George says, "every decision I've ever made in my entire life has been wrong," and he attempts to fix things by going against his first instinct.
As Jerry tells him, "If every instinct you have is wrong, then the opposite would have to be right."
Long before Seinfeld, kids loved Opposite Day, especially when they want something. For example, Daniel breaks it out when he's negotiating to have ice cream for lunch.
"You said I can't have ice cream now, but it's Opposite Day, so I can." That trick never works on me, as far as Linda knows.
Anyway, after I finished grinding my teeth on breakfast, I put on a flannel shirt and jeans. Oops. That had to be replaced on Opposite Day by a suit jacket buried so deeply in my closet that moths were renting townhouses in the pockets.
I put on the jacket, a tie, dress pants, and shoes, and--with a 4-day stubble and gravity-defying hair--I looked like a college kid who'd stolen his dad's suit. A very, very old college kid.
I soon found the rhythm of Opposite Day, though, as I paused before every action to consider its opposite.
I shaved for once, I skipped my usual mid-morning soda, I tuned to a hip-hop/rap radio station in the car instead of rock, and I tried to remember to answer phone calls with nonsense phrases, such as "Scooby-scooby dooooo!"
I needed to find an opposite for my daily workout. I've read recently how more runners are going barefoot, so I ditched my Nikes for my run in the community park.
Walk a mile in someone else's shoes--ha! I ran a mile in no one's shoes.
And it hurt. What are these people thinking? I made it about 100 yards on the concrete before I hoofed it onto the grass for the rest of the way.
After cleaning up post-run, I found my jacket-and-tie look raised eyebrows at the bus stop. Even worse, another parent offered suggestions for my week.
"Does that mean you'll make dinner for the family all week? And you'll go to bed early?"
"Thanks, those are great ideas. I'll have to try them," I told her, happily aware of what I was saying on Opposite Day.
Day 2
It's dangerous how quickly Linda and I have become comfortable with Opposite Week. When absurd is the norm, you tend to overlook the obvious.
That's how I ended up standing at a deli counter last night with all of my clothes inside out. The two guys behind the counter didn't question the moron in the room, but when a woman came out from the back, she was more direct.
"Why are your pants inside out?" she asked.
Not your standard icebreaker, but a good question nonetheless.
Since I'd been wearing my clothes that way all day, Linda and I no longer
thought it odd.If so, maybe she would have gone to the deli for bread, and I wouldn't have been standing in front of three strangers with my inside-out pockets flapping like Dumbo's ears.
I explained, of course, that it was Opposite Week--which made even less sense--took my bread, and drove home.
When I got there, I asked Linda if anything about me seemed unusual. She said no. An instant later she realized: "Oh geez, you went out like that?"
Actually, I'd already made an appearance with my inside-out look. I went to the bus stop after school, and I'd gotten a similar initial reaction from the neighborhood moms.
They said nothing for the first minute, until Linda drove by, rolled down her window, and yelled, "Sorry you have to be seen in public with him."
One mom laughed, relieved. "I wasn't sure what was going on, but I was afraid to ask."
They know me better than the deli guys, so Opposite Week made perfect sense--in a "I'm glad he's not my husband" sort of way.
I bet they'll be really jealous of Linda when they see me wearing women's clothes tomorrow.
Day 3
It's hard to remember to do the opposite of the little things every day. Sure, I can wear my clothes inside out, but it's tricky remembering to answer the phone by saying "Good-bye" and then ending the conversation with "Hello."
It's especially difficult when my first meal of the day has to be strawberries or a banana instead of my standard breakfast brain food of nachos or pizza.
The other day, Linda looked at me funnier than usual and asked, "Are you going to change your part?"
To see how it would look, she reached over to touch my hair--doesn't she know better yet?--and I pulled away. "I'll do it, but it has to be tomorrow," I said. "The hair's working right now."
I haven't listened to my regular radio stations since Sunday. I experiment with a different radio format each time I'm in the car; once, I stumbled across a college station--that or the DJ was moaning in agony while being slow-roasted over a fire.
I understand alternative music wants to be "different," but a singer shouldn't sound like a wounded cat unless his name is Bob Dylan.
Another little thing I found myself needing to change was my desire to clean up the kitchen. I don't cook, but I take my kitchen clean-up job seriously.
In that way, Linda and I play to our strengths since she's a good cook but takes a laissez-faire approach to post-meal clean-up.
I entered the kitchen yesterday after Hurricane Linda had blown through for lunch.
The milk had escaped and was bolting for the back door, plates were everywhere, cabinet doors were open as the soup cans prepared to sky-dive, and I don't know how a peanut butter-covered knife got stuck to the plant on the windowsill.
Unfortunately, it was only after I'd cleaned up that I realized I shouldn't have.
So when I saw Linda later, I told her of my new hands-off approach, knowing she'd be proud that I'm sticking to the literal definition of Opposite Week.
"Wait--you can't not help out!" she said, with a panicked look as if I'd told her we were going to a baseball doubleheader. "That's totally unacceptable. And you can quote me on that."
I guess if I'm not going to clean up, then the opposite would mean I'd have to cook. Or we can eat out!
Except I'd want to go to Burger King and we'd have to do the opposite and go somewhere healthy. Is there such a place as Broccoli King?
Day 4
My to-do list is a magical place. Aside from being where I keep my days organized, it's also where I write the honey-do jobs I get from Linda.
And by merely saying I'm writing her request on my to-do list, I imply the job will be finished soon. Hey, it's on the list.
In fact, it's more likely to be months and months before I even consider thinking about possibly asking Linda exactly what it was she wanted me to do.
Ahhh, but along came Opposite Week to ruin my perfect system. So, this week, when Linda has made a request, I stop what I'm doing and do whatever she wants right away.
I moved some items from the shed to the basement. I did the laundry. I moved chairs from one spot to another (and I'm sure I'll have to move them back at some point).
It's funny, but I never realized how often I procrastinated on her requests. Or how many requests she makes.
The error I made the other night was asking Linda if she noticed what I had been doing. That's a rookie mistake a guy eight years into the marriage game just shouldn't make.
Because while she appreciated my new effort, she also decided to capitalize on it immediately.
After I was already tucked into bed and ready to read, she asked me to get her glasses from another room. I got back, and then she realized she needed water.
I was tempted to set my alarm for two in the morning and wake her then to see if she needed anything else.
Days 5 & 6
I started Friday morning talking and acting like Patrick Star, SpongeBob Squarepants' dim-witted friend who's a combination of Homer Simpson and a pink eraser.
Here's a typical Patrick quote: "I can't see my forehead!" Patrick seems pretty opposite of me.
Patrick's voice and thought process came so easily that I had Daniel snorting milk out of his nose in no time. But there was a reason I picked it up so quickly.
"Is acting like Patrick really all that opposite for you?" Linda asked.
My next behavior was also easy to do: Instead of getting dressed after waking up, I stayed in my pajamas all day.
It was contagious--or my family is a little lazy--but everyone else stayed in their pajamas until the early afternoon. Daniel and I even played kickball in our pajamas.
I pitched with my opposite hand, kicked with my opposite foot, and ran the bases in reverse, going third-second-first-home.
Once, I ran the wrong way on a home run, and Daniel caught me: "Do-over!"
It's amazing how often kids call for do-overs when something goes against them. I'd like to be able to do that in life.
A cop would pull me over for speeding: "I'm gonna take a do-over if that's alright."
If my stocks tank, "Do-over! And while I'm at it, time-travel me back to 1986 so I can buy enough Microsoft stock to buy myself more do-overs."
Anyway, that's about when I realized I shouldn't even be playing kickball with Daniel. Because I wanted to play, then I should have done the opposite and not played, which is what I explained to him. "Oh, no! So you have to go inside?" he said. "I don't want you to!"
In this case, I caved and continued playing. I was simply following the lead of the Tooth Fairy, who visited Daniel this week after he lost his third tooth.
During Opposite Week, the Tooth Fairy shouldn't have shown up, but the Tooth Fairy had mercy on Linda and me.
In my pajamas, slippers, and bathrobe, I drove Daniel to a friend's house to play. Later we had our friends Tim and Colleen over for "dinner with the creepy guy in pajamas," as Colleen called it.
I hope that nickname doesn't stick as I get older. I'd hate to take Hugh Hefner's title.
Day 7
When a toddler takes his first tentative steps, it's cute, there's a soft pitter-patter of tiny feet, and people stop what they're doing to watch. "Isn't that cute?"
When a grown man runs from room to room for the silliest of reasons, it's like a rhino is on the loose.
Linda looked at me with horror, and my 7-year-old stuck out his foot to pretend to trip me. Only 17-year-old Caitlin was on my side: "I'm impressed you're still running, Dad," she said after watching and hearing 45 minutes of it.
I decided the opposite of casually walking around the house, would be to sprint from place to place, much the way boys aged 4 to 7 do. It was kind of fun while it lasted.
"Are you going to do that all day?" Linda eventually asked when I ran into the office and it sounded like waves crashing.
Yep, I answered. "Do you have to CLUMP-CLUMP-CLUMP?" she wondered.
I'm past my athletic prime--and more likely to pick up a Butterfingers than a basketball--so yes, it's fair to say clumping and running go together for me now.
However, since Linda was working on a sewing project, she vetoed my running plan.
It was time anyway to take our annual picture of the kids, or as I now think of it: The Height of Opposite Week. I came to that conclusion when Linda said to a 7-year-old with ants in his pants, "Stay still, Daniel."
He was already doing the exact opposite before she finished saying it. Daniel wouldn't stay still if I promised him a week's worth of candy, the apex of little kid bribery. I know, I've tried it before.
I finished Opposite Week by foregoing watching the NFL so I could perform a long-delayed household chore: removing wet leaves from our gutters.
Rain-soaked dogs who've rolled in manure smell like roses compared to the gunk I found. It'll be days before I shake the smell of years-old, drenched, decaying leaves sitting in gutters.
So, of course, when I was finished I went in to give Linda a great big, wet hug. Wow, she can move quickly--talk about seeing a person do some serious CLUMP-CLUMP-CLUMPING.
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