Dear Queenie,
My wife always puts off doing things until the last minute, and then something always happens to prevent her from getting it done on time, or at all. It never seems to occur to her to start doing something ahead of time so that if anything goes wrong, she will have enough time to cope with the problem.
Like, she wanted to wear a certain outfit to a party we were going to, but she didn’t think to wash it until the morning of the day of party and then it rained, so the outfit didn’t get dry in time for her to wear it.
Another time she wanted to cook a special dinner for my folks when they came to visit, but she didn’t check to make sure she had all the ingredients and sure enough she was out of one of them and when I went to the store to get if for her they were out too and the dinner was spoiled.
Queenie, this kind of thing happens over and over and over again and still she doesn’t seem to learn. What’s wrong with her?—Losing patience
Dear Losing patience,
Either your wife is totally scatter-brained, or she is the eternal “cockeyed optimist,” as the song puts it.
A long time ago, engineers discovered what they called “Murphy’s Law.” It goes like this:
Nothing is as easy as it looks.
Everything takes longer than you expect.
And if something can go wrong, it will, at the worst possible moment!
I suggest you give your wife a framed copy of Murphy’s Law and remind her to read it every time you see her putting off doing something important.
