Manic Motherhood: Listening to the Voices in My Head

Manic Motherhood

I'm just doing what the voices in my head tell me to do…

Author Unknown

I have Bluetooth and it's driving me mad. But I had to get it because of a California law that says that people like me (i.e., really bad drivers) cannot talk on a hand-held cell phone, sip a skinny iced chai, rule unruly children, find a good song on the radio and steer at the same time. To the creators of that law I say, "Okay, you might have a point."


But I will tell you, I didn't always think that way. In fact, I spent about a week resisting the law. Unfortunately, I went to Catholic school and I am physically incapable of breaking the law. Seriously. You survive 12 years of Sister Mary something or other threatening you with purgatory and see if you can break any laws after you escape…er, graduate.


But even if I couldn't break the law, I could try to find a way around it. So I spent 7 days screaming into my speakerphone so I wouldn't be holding the phone up to my head and potentially get a ticket. Turns out, that's not really an effective way to communicate. Something about the screaming makes everyone you talk with think you are either a) really ticked off; or b) insane.


Since I like to hide my insanity, I got a Bluetooth. And as that turns out, the Bluetooth doesn't do a good job at hiding my insanity, it just makes me more insane-and that's not just because now that everyone has a Bluetooth I spend half my life wondering whether random strangers are saying "hi" to me or just talking on the phone. No, there are a few more reasons.


First of all, just getting the Bluetooth out of the package was an ordeal. I couldn't get the plastic cut correctly, so I finally just ripped it open with my teeth. (At this point, I'd like to take a second to apologize to my parents, who paid for a lot of dentistry work on teeth that probably won't last until I'm fifty.) Anyway, I finally got the thing out, and stuffed it in my ear to see how it looked. Unfortunately, it still had that sticky stuff on it that makes the Bluetooth stay on the packaging.


I won't bore you with details, but let me just say that the sticky stuff bonds like cement to the inner workings of the human ear. I finally cleared my ear of obstructions and took the Bluetooth out to charge it up. Here's a hint. Don't wear dangly earrings and a Bluetooth. It hurts more than you can imagine when one or the other is forcibly removed.


But that wasn't the last of my Bluetooth pain. Apparently, Bluetooth only works when it's turned on. Who knew? On my first Bluetooth day, I'm driving and I hear my phone ring. I tap the little Bluetooth and wait for the voices to speak to my head. But I still hear ringing. So I tap again. And then the ringing stops and I say "hello" about fifty times. Nobody answers.


At the grocery store, I check my phone. There's nobody there, so I put it away. A few minutes later I hear someone very far away calling, "Laurie, Laurie" from behind me. I turn around. The voices call again and they are again coming from behind me. I turn. The voices turn. And that's when I realized that the voices were coming from my butt.


Now, I don't know about you, but in general hearing voices come from your tush creates one of those moments when you realize that you might have some serious mental health issues. Or, like me, you could have put your phone in the back pocket of your jeans without locking the keypad and accidentally dialed your husband who is about to burst a vocal cord trying to get you to realize that he's on the phone speaking to your right buttock.


And yes, it would have been handy to have the Bluetooth turned on. That would have saved my husband's vocal cords and me from looking like a dog chasing her tail amongst the granola. If you are wondering, that's not a good look for me.


But I haven't given up yet. I'm sure that Bluetooth and I will bond. Or at least that someday in the future, I'll remember to turn it on before I try to use it.


About Manic Motherhood: Laurie Sontag is the author of the popular humor blog, Manic Motherhood at http://lauriesontag.com and has been a humor columnist for California newspapers since 2001. If you can't find her at Manic Motherhood, check under the sofa. She's not there, but she likes it when somebody else tries to find the lost socks and freak out the dust bunnies.