Why Do We Do These Crazy Things?

A meditation on habits that live on Beyond their Expiration Date (B.E.D.)

Photo: Cade for Unsplash

Early in my marriage, when both of my in-laws were acting in what seemed to us bizarre, irrational ways, I turned to my wife in frustration and asked, “Do you suppose we all go crazy when we get older?”

            My father-in-law was refusing to let go of something – there were so many things he wouldn’t let go of, and in this case it probably was his financial disclosures for my wife’s student aid application. (Not long after, her youngest sister wrote from college about her freshman psychology course. “I just learned that Daddy is anal retentive. When did you know?”) My mother-in-law, meanwhile, would visit our apartment, inspect it carefully, and exclaim every few minutes: “You know what you need? You need a _____(toaster/wet mop/microwave/air conditioner).” She was right, but we were broke and the reminders didn’t seem that helpful.

            And speaking of irrational, how could you explain Great-Aunt Sadie, a woman of means who spoke proudly of her donations to the art museum and never left a reception without stealthily slipping several cookies into her handbag in our dotage?

We concluded that what we were seeing wasn’t crazy at all, it was just learned behaviors that were still in play long Beyond their Expiration Date (B.E.D.). Behavior that made sense at one time, but was inappropriate at present.

Fast forward to today, where I may be becoming the kind of person I warned my wife about. At age 70, in other words, I find myself face to face with some irrational B.E.D. behavior of my own. When I took a hard look at some of my odd, quirky daily habits, I was stunned by how much of my life was consumed by what might charitably be called “conserving” or, less generously, “scrimping.”  Habits like:

• Squeezing the tube hard for every last dollop of toothpaste.

• Using a sliver of bath soap until it falls to pieces.

• Disposing no razor blade before its time, which is never less than two weeks.

• Scraping the pot for every last morsel of leftovers, leaving no rice behind.  

• Harvesting used paper clips for reuse – although I have hundreds of new paper clips in unopened boxes.

• Not running the dishwasher until it is filled to the gills.         

         These are not the behaviors of a person in comfortable financial circumstances, which I am fortunate to be. These are behaviors of a person who fears scarcity and worries whether there will be enough money for groceries and rent unless every wasteful expenditure is curtailed.

            Since I haven’t been in that position for many years, yet have been maintaining these quirky habits forever, it leads me to wonder where these B.E.D. actions come from. Are they nature or nurture? DNA or D.E.B.T.?

            I will leave it to future scientists to determine whether my genes might have been altered by multiple generations of impoverished and landless peasantry. For now, though, I am inclined to blame it on the Great Depression.

            In 1930, the year after the great stock market crash, my mother was 4 years old and my father was 5. If they were as impressionable as most children that age, they would have absorbed the admonitions of their parents and grandparents: Waste nothing, save everything, reuse whatever you can. The very survival of our family hangs in the balance.

            And when they became parents, my parents did what most parents do when they encountered a situation for the first time: they defaulted to what they remembered hearing from their parents: Waste nothing, save everything, reuse whatever you can. Perhaps the survival of the family was still at stake, even in the 1950s and 1960s, but one might legitimately question whether that was reality or a perception lodged in minds shaped by earlier times.

            Now here I am in the 21st century, acting on impulses that were totally appropriate 91 years ago and B.E.D. today.

            I wonder what other inappropriate voices still ricochet inside my addled brain?

Your Take

Have you found yourself acting in ways that are habitual but not exactly rational or appropriate? Please share. I would feel a lot better knowing I’m not the only odd duck out there.