I’ve mentioned resistentialism once before. My favorite definition is the apparently perverse or spiteful behavior of inanimate objects. We have all experienced the hostility of common possessions: The corner of the table that jumps out and hits your hip as you hurry past. The Internet that decides to go down when you have limited time to perform a simple task. The pen picks the moment it is needed to roll off the counter and accelerate across the floor.
Mondays are “wash” days at our house, and we once made the bed, new sheets and all, in one minute and forty-seven seconds. (We are not 300-pillows-on-the-bed people.) Resistentialism had lost its power that evening. No inside-out fitted sheet. No pillowcase embedded in a twisted knot.
So, this morning, we had the stopwatch going while emptying the dishwasher. We were carrying things to their proper places, and it was going well. We weren’t hurrying, but kept moving. A knife suddenly made a jump for it and clattered to the floor. Ruth groused, “Come on, give us a little help here.” I agreed with her. That knife has minimal responsibilities in this world. It doesn’t have to worry about paying bills or feeding the cat. AND, the knife knows where it belongs. It has made the short trip from the dishwasher to the drawer its entire life.
So, why did the knife try for an escape today? The answer is resistentialism, plain and simple. This impish behavior was the knife’s way of having a little fun at our expense.
Three minutes and five seconds.
