Crazybusy - take a moment

I've been getting back into the physiology and workings of the brain lately, especially around the ideas of intelligence, working memory, and the way our minds react to stimulus.  More in the coming days on those, but wanted to share the opening words of Crazybusy, a book by Edward Hallowell, M.D.  It's an 11-second vignette describing his reaction to an old rotary phone, and a nice reminder that our brains sometimes take the quick and easy path.


As you run into the inevitable annoyances and challenges of daily life - maybe a coffee pot that runneth over, a co-worker that clips his nails in his cube, or the dog that chewed your homework - remember to take a deep breath, count to 10 (or perhaps 11 in the bit below), and give that wonderful, rational brain of yours time to kick in.

Best,
Bryan

My family stayed at a lakeside cottage last summer where the only telephone was an old-fashioned rotary model.  The cottage was so remote that there was no cell phone service, just the stolid black telephone sitting atop a tattered phone book on an end table next to a worn-out peach-colored couch.

I remember the first time I dialed that phone.  It was morning.  I’d gone out for a wake-me-up swim, poured myself  a cup of coffee, and was sitting on the couch to call a friend to see if he and his kids might like to join my wife, my kids, and me that night at a minor league baseball game.  There was no urgency  this call, no need for me to hurry.

Yet as I started to dial, got angry, and impatience flamed within me because on this phone I had to wait for the rotor to wind back to its starting point after each number.  It was so slow!  In addition, it made an irritating screeching sound as it retraced its cycle, like a rusty metal drawer stuck on its runners: 5…4…2…6…I could have entered the entire number on a touch-tone phone in the time it took me to dial just one number on this obsolete contraption.  Not to mention how much faster I could have done it with speed dial had I been able to use my cell phone.

By the time I had laboriously cranked out the entire number, I was in a total snit.  How could anyone still own such a slow phone?  I fumed.  What a stupid phone!  How backward!  How dumb!  But then I caught myself.  This was absurd.  When my friend finally answered, I spoke to him, hung up, and then redialed his number, timing how long it took me:  eleven seconds exactly.  As if putting my life in danger, those eleven slow seconds had annoyed me beyond reason.  What a fool I had become.  What a modern man.