An Out of Order Life

I love a routine.  I love my own routines and I love hearing about other people’s – you know, how they take off their makeup, read the newspaper, make their bed, really just anything.  My friend Joe Clark and I can happily spend an hour going over how each of us makes our oatmeal.  Joe has a true process -- doubles the recipe, toasts the oatmeal, freezes, and more that I cannot remember.  On our recent vacation, I explained my morning smoothie process starting with, “First, I get out of bed, walk downstairs, then…”  I know that it is hard to believe that Joe listened with rapt attention, but he really did.  A systematic, orderly, routine process is fun.

So, it really messed me up recently when I forgot to put my Kerastace leave-in conditioner and oleo relax on my hair prior to the blow dry.  I washed and conditioned (I use Davines smoothing shampoo and conditioner), got out of the shower, heard something on The Today Show that I wanted to see in the bedroom (I’m sure that this is what messed up my routine), then just came back in and started blow drying my hair.  While I was drying I could tell that the hair didn’t feel the same, but I didn’t yet realize what had gone so wrong.  I finished drying and squeezed the conditioner and oleo relax into my hand and put it into the dry hair – and that was when I realized my mistake.  Horrors.

NOTE:  One great benefit to our hot summer weather in Dallas is low humidity.  Low Humidity = Good Hair.

ANOTHER NOTE:  I use really expensive stuff on my hair.  I use drug store soap and makeup, but my hair enjoys the best.  It is a splurge, but man that stuff works to make frizzy, curly hair behave.

Anyway, this hair fiasco got me thinking about order in processes.  There is a traditional order to life.  The lucky ones of us were born to 2 parents who planned for and who wanted us.  We grew up in a decent home with a brother or sister or two, went to school until we were 18, headed off to college, graduated, got married, had kids, and the cycle continued.  But sometimes this order is changed.

Some kids in Dallas County aren’t born to parents who wanted them and once the kids arrive, that doesn’t change.  To some parents, finding the next high is more important than getting a kid off to school.  Some kids are born to other kids.  Many kids don’t graduate from school and college is as close to their reality as the moon. 

The traditional order is twisted.  The routine, the order, the process is off.  But the kids can’t blame The Today Show. 

BUT, just because a kid is born into an out-of-order life, he can still be successful.  And that is what we are trying to help ensure every day at Community Partners of Dallas.  Her parents may have loved heroin more than they loved her, but with help and support from a foster parent or a relative, that little girl will succeed.  And we can help that new family thrive.  We can help change the order.

P.S.  My hair turned out totally fine that day, in fact Joanna said she thought I was having a good hair day that day.   Routines can change.