Murphy's Law and Modern Science

My new mantra is: "Never go on vacation." Or, perhaps, I should amend that to, "Never go on vacation if you are of Irish descent." There's this karmic individual, to whom we Irish folk refer as "Murphy." Murphy has these Laws he made up himself and by which all Irish folks' lives are governed (we should all be so lucky as to have the ability to force others to bend to our whims in such a fashion!) Murphy's Laws go something like this: "Anything that can go wrong will go wrong, at the worst possible time and in the most horrendous fashion possible." In other words, I'm talking about that Irish Curse.

One should always put a name to these things, no? It makes it so much easier to discuss them when we have a name to go along with the symptoms. I think this is why they created the term, "ADD". That stands for, "My parents never told me no, so I'm sure as hell not going to listen to some other grown up." ADD is a nice, simple moniker for this particular issue; everyone recognizes it. Just try an experiment: Go to a psychiatrist's office and tell the person behind that big, expensive mahogany desk, "Little [insert name here] won't listen to anyone. [S/he] is out of control. We've never told [him/her] "no" and now we can't seem to discipline effectively!" The psychiatrist is likely to drag your whole family in for a few sessions, clearly not understanding what you are trying to say and feeling (gasp!) that this may have more to do with family dynamics and roles than with the child in question's behaviors specifically. But if you throw at this person a simple, "I think Little [insert name here] has ADD," then you are guaranteed the appropriate response: Person with psychiatric degree and prescription pad will cursorily evaluate Little So-and-so, check a few boxes on a form when it is discovered that Little So-and-so has a penchant for destroying the expensive office in about ten minutes' worth of time (after all, Little So-and-so is missing out on all sorts of fun things back home to be here and is feeling disgruntled!) and write out that all-important prescription that will magically allow you some peace and quiet as Little So-and-so takes a breather for a few hours on his or her newly prescribed, mood-altering, hormone-regulating downers. It's too bad we don't have the same nice, neat, prescriptive answer to the Irish Curse, although I'm sure there are doctors and researchers in the UK working on it. In the meantime, I reiterate: if you are of Irish descent, do NOT go on vacation. No psychiatrist is going to be able to do anything with your Murphy complex. There aren't any formal prescriptions available - this would be why the Irish tend to drink frequently. Drunkenness, while not a solution, certainly helps to dull the pain Murphy's havoc can wreak. Frankly, until modern science catches up with the needs of the Irish-descended populace, I see no reason why Irish folks oughtn't to enjoy a good, stout Guinness or four, not given my own personal experiences with this Daemon.

What happened? The curious reader wonders. Never fear, I am not a cruel and heartless person who teases but never puts out. The story is as follows:

I have a friend who is going to Iraq for his third tour. (Lest you begin to feel sorry for this friend, let me assure you that for him, this is not a curse. He LOVES his job. He is looking forward to going, even. This is not a cry for pity and sympathy on his behalf! Don't lose focus, Gentle Reader, you are here to feel sorry for me, the Cursed One. Revenons a nos moutons.) This friend of mine invited my little family to head down to Nags Head for 24 hours on the beach to visit with him prior to his departure. (I realize that a trip to the beach does not sound tortuous, but I swear to you, you will begin to feel sorry for me soon.) I took a half-day from work on Friday, right before exams, and we headed down to the coastline. It rained like crazy the entire trip down; we even had to pull over a few times because we couldn't see past the water slashing on the windshield; what should have been a five hour jaunt turned into an arduous six and a half hour event.

We had a lovely day and a half visit with my friend. We took lots of pictures of my Darling Daughter's first trip to the beach. It was, in a word, Idyllic. On the way home, I was feeling rested, happy and ready for the arduous task of final examinations to begin on Monday.

Upon reaching our home, I opened the door and - ewww, what was that smell? Ah, yes - my darling sheltie had knocked over the garbage can. We're talking coffee grounds and two-year old, solid-food diapers all the way from the kitchen through the front hall. As we did not leave the fans or air conditioning units on and it is July, let's just say the smell was less-than-fresh. So, at almost nine o'clock at night, we dutifully put Darling Daughter to bed and scrubbed those floors with Murphy's Wood Oil soap (this is not an advertisement, but that stuff is amazing. It smells good, it feels good - all nice and oily - and it leaves a lovely sheen to your floors, at least until the dogs track all over it following the next rainstorm.) And yet-

"It still smells like something died in here," said I to my husband.

"It'll probably take a while for the smell to go away," he said comfortingly.

So, I popped online to check whether or not I had been cast in the fall production of our local theatre troupe. Alas, I had not even been made a Nymph, much less the White Witch. We had not gotten a confirmation email about the loan we are trying to take out to buy our house. I was not published in the New Yorker, although they "thanked me for my interest in contributing." Things in the email world were not going my way. And then, from the other room, my husband's voice, "Oh, God. Melle, come here."

What NOW?

"What" was my twelve year old Persian cat, Dimitri, who had peed on both couches in the family room before offing himself. (In the interest of not upsetting my Gentle Readers, let me say that from appearances, he went quietly and without pain. From the appearance of the couches, I would venture to say he even almost enjoyed his death. And twelve is a fairly advanced age for Persians with lifelong urinary tract and respiratory issues.) Still - my cat was dead. And not just dead, but clearly had died about ten hours earlier or more. And was crawling with fleas, which he was decidedly NOT in life, as we Frontline regularly.

"Oh, no. Look. Where did the fleas come from? Now we'll have to bomb the house." I regret that these were my last words before unceremoniously taking his poor, stiff little body outside for burial.

Upon coming in, I realized that the answering machine was blinking. We had three messages. Normal people might find this utterly normal, returning from two days away rom home, but no one calls us and actually leaves messages, so to have three is something. Only these were definitely not Ed McMahon messages. One of my former students had died the previous week, and we were only just finding out about it. I had missed the emergency meeting on Friday afternoon when they told the staff; I was driving to Nags Head in a pouring down, can't-hardly-see thunderstorm. Did I mention, I had to go in and administer final exams the next day?

We were only gone for 30 hours!

MURPHY! You jackass. I'll get even with you if it's the last thing I ever do. Modern science will break you, we will overcome, we will triumph, Mankind is on the verge of finding the prescription to eradicate your vicious machinations!

In the meanwhile, I'm going to have a Guinness...and I will NOT be going on vacation again. It's not worth it, if you're Irish.