EDMOND — Distractions redirect our attention from one thought/action to another, and that’s more or less good.
Ignorance might be bliss, but it could get you run over or blown away; burn your biscuits; ruin your clothes; leave your household unprotected and complicate your life in general — which is why we have beeps to distract us from the ignorance of our bliss and call us to action.
The oven timer’s beep sends us hurrying to the kitchen to remove biscuits from the oven, and the clothes dryer’s beep sees to it that our wash-and-wear items emerge from the dryer unwrinkled. A series of insistent beeps from our weather alert radios precedes the bulletin that scrolls across the top of our television screens. Our home protection systems beep assurance that they have been activated, and smoke alarms beep their need for new batteries.
Beeps are the good distracters, unlike the honk-honk from behind when we’ve lingered too long at a stop sign. That’s aggravating, but not the honk that warns us we’re about to endanger ourselves and others. The whirling red light of a patrol car or the blinking red lights on our dashboards might or might not be accompanied by a siren, but we had best not ignore either. Ignorance of a pending traffic ticket or an overheated radiator is not bliss, and we can’t in all honesty claim we weren’t warned.
We get to wallowing in the ignorance of our bliss and resent the comfort/safety distracters we’ve programmed into our lives, none of which include the elusive gnat that hovered about my computer monitor this morning. I did not program that distracter, and I would have ignored it if I could, but I couldn’t. I had slap-slap-slapped to the point of frustration before I trounced to the kitchen in search of ammunition, glanced out the back window on the way, and caught a glimpse of the bright orange cannas blooming along the fence.
Beautiful cannas: a welcome distraction from my ongoing gnat war. Surely we could learn to get along. PETA could probably have told us how to do that, but I’m happy to say that it’s now too late to build a lasting relationship with the particular gnat under discussion.
“Saved by the bell” being the exception, we generally don’t enjoy the interruptions that distract us from our bliss, which would naturally exclude the pugilist laid out on the mat listening for that saving bell.
Under normal circumstances, neither man nor beast wishes to be distracted from enjoying the ignorance of bliss. That’s why, when we place a call near the dinner hour or at bedtime, before resuming the conversation we initiated, we ask, “Did I call at a bad time?” You very likely did, but — barring an emergency — unless you’re a telemarketer, only the rudest of those we disturb would admit it.
Animals are different. Even if your cat’s been declawed, you would not dare distract him at his dinner hour, and the old adage advising to “let a sleeping dog lie” exemplifies Fido’s innate distaste for distraction from his sleeping doggy bliss. You had best leave them both alone.
Not that they’ll leave you alone under similar circumstances. Saber-the-cat delights in nibbling my chin if his clawless pat-pats don’t wake me. Sue-the-weenie-dog can’t leap as high as the bed, but the table is lower and I’m easily distracted. Whatever she finds there is hers.
Even so, ignorance of my livestock’s shortcomings is a bliss from which I refuse to be distracted.
MARJORIE ANDERSON is an Edmond resident.
Features
Distractions can be blissful
- Features
-
-
Operating on feelings can be catastrophic
How they raise their kids is a touchy subject for lots of parents.
-
Take care with puppy vaccinations
Q: My son recently bought a 3-month-old mixed Rottweiler-German Shepherd pup from a dog breeder near Tecumseh. He was assured by the breeder that the pup had received a 5 in 1 vaccination two weeks earlier, but the pup got sick about a week after he took it home.
-
Edmond Beautiful plans Spring Garden Tour
Edmond Beautiful Inc. will have a Spring Garden Tour of the 2011 “Yard of the Week” winners May 26-27. The “Yard of the Week” program recognizes yards and gardens during the summer months for outstanding flowers and landscaping.
-
Sometimes it’s easy to let go of the familiar
Remember the clack-clack of the lawn mower you used to push over your yard every week or so before someone finally figured out how to attach a gas engine to the contraption?
-
‘Attachment parenting’ fad benefits only guru
The cover story in last week’s (May 21, 2012) Time Magazine is all about “why attachment parenting drives some mothers to extremes — and how Dr. Bill Sears became their guru.” That is the article’s subtitle. All I can say, somewhat hopefully, is “at last.”
-
Protect pets from poisons in the yard, garden
After an unseasonably warm winter, many gardens and yards around the country are growing and blossoming well ahead of schedule
-
Norman church keeps up hourly adoration
For nearly 10 years, someone has been present every hour of the day, every day of the year inside the chapel less than a block north of St. Joseph’s Catholic Church.
-
Protecting pets from poisons in the yard, garden
After an unseasonably warm winter, many gardens and yards around the country are growing and blossoming well ahead of schedule. Outdoor enthusiasts who are also pet owners are delighted with the early onset of spring, enjoying their outdoor living spaces while watching their pets run and play.
-
Norman church keeps up hourly adoration
For nearly 10 years, someone has been present every hour of the day, every day of the year inside the chapel less than a block north of St. Joseph’s Catholic Church.
Deacon Jeff Willard said when the “Perpetual Adoration” program was started at St. Joseph’s, he thought it might last six months at best. -
Fatherhood illuminates relationship to God
Like most men, when I got married I didn’t know what I was signing up for. I didn’t expect it to change me much. In fact, it wasn’t until we had children that I realized how different I had become. I didn’t sign up to have squalling infants keep me up for hours night after night. I sure didn’t sign up for diaper duty. And the one thing I definitely wasn’t expecting was that these little sewage-secreting noise machines would have cables jacked straight into my heart. What they wanted, I wanted them to have. It wasn’t even a choice.
- More Features Headlines
-
Operating on feelings can be catastrophic
