One of my favorite nerdy books is “Frames of Mind” by John Gardner. Dr. Gardner says that there are eight or nine intelligences that we each as humans can access in different combinations and permutations. One of these is bodily -kinesthetic intelligence, the knowledge of where your body is in space and your ability to manipulate its parts. I wonder what he would think of the following…
I thought I’d fry up some Canadian bacon this morning. I tried to open the package of six slices by following the directions on the small, about one-eighth of an inch, red line: “Peel here.”
What are the manufacturers of this package talking about? Who has fingers so adept that they can manipulate this tiny strip of plastic? Like Charlie Brown and the football, I’d ignored my past experiences. First with my fingers, then with some tweezers, then, growing frustrated, I grabbed the kitchen shears …you know the kind you use to cut through chicken bones … to open the pack. I could not peel open the plastic, nor could I cut through it. I finally had to break my rule about using my fabric shears in order to access the meat.
Unusual? Not for me. Yesterday I followed the directions to “Press here,” indicating a triangular area with a dotted line which would, when opened, allow me to add some washing soda to my laundry. I had to use a kitchen knife to get into the box.
Or consider, and this is so wrong, the directions printed in tiny, tiny letters on the back of a blister pack of Imodium tablets … the meds you reach for when things are getting very serious with your lower alimentary canal. Rapid opening is both the need and watch phrase of the moment. Lots of luck! The blister pack says to fold and peel. It also says to use scissors if fold and peel doesn’t work. News flash: Fold and peel has never worked.
If you look around my house you’ll see I do not have a box of tissues with the oval or round opening that is actually round or oval. Again, the directions to press on the dotted line never work. The same can be said of the box that holds the K cups for my Keurig machine.
Is there some sadistically evil cartel of container manufacturers that designs these impossible access points? You would think so.
I blame at least part of this on the evil guy who, in 1982, put cyanide into tablets of Tylenol. Up until then, you could open things. After? Well, I have two bottles of Afrin that defy anyone. Even the pharmacists at Walmart could not open them. Those “push- down- and- turn” medicine bottles could mean the difference between life and death – OK…maybe not death – but something almost worse. What about the bottles which have another layer of protection glued to their tops? It seems they are glued with a substance that defies release. Again, to get to the meds, you need a kitchen knife. Geesh. How are these containers “child safe?”
And what about the seemingly-useless layers of packaging? I bought a set of ear buds that was not only affixed to the carboard on which they lay with impossible-to-untie plastic strips, but was also encased in some kind of impermeable substance that could only be breached by using a can opener. Why? Who has a can opener at the ready for such extractions?
Why does my face cream come in a jar that is thicker than the sides of a castle wall? Why is it in a box that has a large open space walled off by more cardboard? To fool me into thinking that I am getting more product? Maybe. To look substantial? Who knows. Seems odd and a waste of materials that will only end up in the landfill, and with more finagling of carboard and glue, of course.
And where does all this plastic packaging end up? From what I’ve recently read, it wanders through the disposal systems and winds up in a large patch of junk in the Pacific Ocean.
Of course, this series of problems could be my fault. Come to think of it, I was never good at opening things. It took me three months to learn how to use the combination numbers for my locker in high school. I carried all of my books to all of my classes until some good soul took pity on me and explained how to use the numbers to get the lock to work.
Apropos of Dr. Gardner’s work, some of us have it. Some of us don’t. I am in the latter group.
