Friday, November 2, 2007

The Backseat Experiment

I've recently realized that the backseat of my car is a window into my life. A week ago, it was a chaotic mess filled with random stuff. And I felt chaotic and messy and random. Today, this is what it looks like:



A bit more orderly with a quilt conveniently hiding the desperate need of vacuuming. Here's an inventory of the stuff:

  • A bible - Easy to grab for church on Saturday night or bible study on Tuesday night, I keep this bible in it's grey wool cover in the car
  • Grout - I need to grout between the tile and transition pieces in our hallway
  • A sympathy card - Another sweet cancer kid went to be with Jesus last week (Labri)
  • Diapers, formula, baby wipes - I'm ready for the call!!!
  • Washcloths - Restocking the new bathroom

That's a pretty accurate summary of my life right now! I'm curious if I am (as usual) an anomaly or if this phenomenon is the same for other people. So indulge me as I conduct an informal survey aptly titled "The Backseat Experiment." There is only one question in this survey and there are no wrong answers. Tell me...what's in your backseat?

11 comments:

Jennifer November 2, 2007 at 1:51 PM  

I remember, back before I had kids, practically looking down on my friends with kids because of the state of their backseats...well, God does have a sense of humor. There are two car seats...both with some kind of food stains on them, two McDonalds Bee Movie toys, a couple of mashed up wheat thins on the floor, 5 or 6 hot wheels and a "Cars" movie themed car bingo card. Oh yeah...and Sunday school papers from last weekend.

Anonymous November 2, 2007 at 3:27 PM  

OH Gosh....The better question is WHAT ISN'T IN MY BACKSEAT?!?!?! I drive a minivan, so it is WAY to easy to compile huge amounts of CRAP in there. I often tell John its my rolling office space. So lets see, I have 2 large carseats, 2 car "blankees" a canvas bin that is supposed to hold all of the car "toys" and books, but rarely does. It is often times filled with spare changes of clothes and fast food wrappers. OK, there is also a Nike duffle that doubles as my diaper bag.....2 toy airplanes from daddy's last trip, a dum dum sucker stuck to the floor, gold fish crackers (both whole and smashed) 3 baby dolls, 2 Dr. seuss books and an elmo book...Oh ya, just this afternoon I found a drink cup wedged under the seat that had some mysterious, gelatinous goo in it. I threw it away rather than attempting to make it clean enough to drink out of again.....
Oh how I wish for a clean backseat.
-Lindsay

Anonymous November 2, 2007 at 5:10 PM  

My back seat is empty :( I think that means I am going to protest your analogy of back seat and life correlation. Or just admit that I am an out of control neat freak :) Michelle

Anonymous November 2, 2007 at 5:59 PM  

Scott would laugh about this blog! He is always giving me a hard time about how dirty my car is. Of course I have two car seats covered in crumbs (even though I vowed to never let my children eat in my new car). Then church bulletin from a few sundays ago, Joshua's art from school & church, a couple acorns from Joshua (despite the fact that he knows to leave the earth outside they seem to sneak in), a few O's (snack for later), 2 ladybug magazines, I love my mommy because.. book, stuffed tiger (small happy meal toy), another random happy meal toy, matchbox car, a small empty snack cup and I think that is about it. The back also had two big bags of dog food, baby carrier and the double stroller :) Yes the question is better yet what is not in the car! Thank goodness I don't have a minivan because I have a hard enough time keeping my car clean!

Anonymous November 2, 2007 at 6:56 PM  

you don't even want to know!! -Becci :)

Anonymous November 2, 2007 at 8:50 PM  

My backseat houses the material grocery bags that I forget to take into the stores 98% of the time, my granddaughter's car seat, children's books, the plug-in car food/drink cooler (great item), a towel?,my black scandals, plus crumbs. The backseat of any sophisticated person involved in the legal field. My windshield sparkles for I cleaned it yesterday, the rest of the BLACK care needs a lot of help. Kathy

Anonymous November 2, 2007 at 11:12 PM  

Well, in our van there's nothing in the backseat normally...I know...AMAZING. There is though when my brothers, mom and I are in it, but normally my Dad drives the van and he is so neat and tidy he hates it if we leave "junk" in the backseat. But, in our car we can leave stuff in it because my mom and brother drive that one. :) Let's see, what's normally can be found in our car is...a Bible, my older brother's school bag, my little brother's flip-flops (weird, I know) my mom's ear piece to her cell phone and all her papers, sunglasses...occasionally one of my many books. We actually are getting better about keeping the car clean, the stuff in the above list aren't always in there, it just varies with who's driving when. My brother and I used to accidentally leave a school book in the car and if my dad ended up taking it to work then guess what? We didn't have to do that subject since we didn't have the book. Unfortunately, that rarely happened but I guess if we were actually smart we'd have put our school book in on purpose so then we wouldn't have to do it. Too bad we aren't smart like that, guess that's why we gotta have school :)

Anonymous November 2, 2007 at 11:18 PM  

oh yeah, this doesn't happen anymore since now my little brother is finally out of his booster seat, but he had a booster seat that had cupholders on it and we were always like "Ben, geez, you don't put nacho cheese sauce in the cupholder!" When we'd drive thru Taco Bell he would put his nacho cheese container in there, which was fine, but he'd forget to take it out, so then he'd just close the cup holder and forget about it for like a week when someone would be like "Ben left his cheese in again!" Thankfully he doesn't do that very often now, mainly because my parents make us pick up ALL of our trash. Okay sorry, I'm done with my story now!

Anonymous November 7, 2007 at 11:31 PM  

Can I just say, I LOVE YA!!?? You always crack me up, I am so excited to tell you I have NOTHING in my BACK seat....wait, does a middle seat/backseat count? I have a lot of DVD's, hair stuff for NIna and Grady's animals. The backseat remains pure....ahhh.

Thank you for always being a positive light in my day.
Katie

Anonymous November 8, 2007 at 9:40 PM  

My backseat really is my traveling office. It current holds an IQ test, an achievement test, a set of executive function tests (all of those come in locked suitcases that make it look like my backseat is actually full of millions of dollars in cash, like in a spy movie...sigh, I wish), a sweet "boombox" straight out of 1992 that my teenage clients laugh at, something like 14 empty water bottles that I always intend to re-use but forget them in the car, and three chamois-cloth-thingies to clean my glasses when I go to rub my eyes and squish my finger straight into the lenses (like I haven't worn glasses for the past six years...and this still happens almost daily!). Covering all of this is a not-so-fine layer of dog hair because Bandit goes into hysterics every time he gets in the car and hair just EXPLODES off of him like he's a porcupine shooting out quills. When I first got my beloved car I would vacuuum, dust and wash it when even a speck of dust settled on it...that quickly impractical now that I'm traveling between offices on the east and west sides of Portland on a weekly basis, let alone between Oregon and Pennsylvania on a monthly basis. I look forward to the days of backseats full of carseats, cheerios, blankies and toys! ~Cousin Sara

Anonymous November 8, 2007 at 11:29 PM  

Lori, you are too funny. You come up with the wildest things to talk about, and they always bring out smiles and laughs. I love the new bathroom- amazing job to both of you! Back to the backseat...2 car seats, kleenex, coffee cups for McKayla to puke in, towels, washcloths, hand sanitizer, baby wipes, 2 pillows, the purple hospital gloves, face masks that McKayla won't wear, her all about me poster for the hospital door. I think that's everything. Not your typical back seat items...

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