I am a New Yorker who is always on the go. Well, almost always. I eat while walking and teleconferencing to and from meetings. My legs are restless and just need to keep going. I run, run, run. You get the picture. You can imagine that when I’m ready to leave the house I am all set to run out and hit the pavement. I typically get in close to 5,000 steps en route to work. Whew! I love getting that energy out.

As I walk out of my apartment I do chuckle, mightily. I walk out. Then I question whether I grabbed everything I needed. I go back in and check. Then I walk back out. Then I stop mid-way down the hallway and wonder whether I turned off the flat iron. I, of course, have to rush back in. And, nine times of out of ten I have indeed turned it off. Actually, it is an even higher likelihood that I havd turned it off. It’s rite. Routine. I flatiron my hair and just automatically unplug without thinking.

Yet, yesterday was different. I did my dance of going back in and out. And, lo and behold I went back in to the bathroom and I had actually left the flat iron on. I couldn’t believe that I had done that. It is extremely unlike me to leave it on. My routine was broken. I had been distracted apparently. My mind had wandered. I didn’t walk around like a zombie. Which was a bad thing, laughingly enough. When I’m a zombie I follow the routine and the house won’t burn down.