I realize you think you are the only one whose house isn’t picked up, or that nobody else has ever locked their keys in the car with it running.  But, I’ve got news for you… you aren’t that different from everyone else.  Here are four ways that you might relate to…

1.  Your refrigerator has several items in it that you would not eat. In fact, they are so old that you wouldn’t feed them to a dog.  Even a dog you don’t like.

Don’t worry, it’s hard to keep up with every cup of yogurt, stalk of celery, and hunk of cheese in there.  There’s bound to be a take-home box from PF Chang’s that we forget about. For three months.  A word of wisdom, earned by experience: do not, under any circumstance, throw away any expired dairy products until trash day. Right before you take the trash to the curb. With the trash collectors standing ready to take your expired milk. In a double-Walmart-bagged containment situation.

2.  You have been so good at calling in fake-sick that you started to buy your own story.

It goes without saying that we have all called in sick when we weren’t. We have all done that and you know it.  What you didn’t know is that we have all also been so into our sick story that we, too, convinced ourselves that we were sick.

3.  Someone tells you they saw you in your car out and about. Maybe at a stop light. You wonder and maybe ask – were you picking your nose…

Look, I get that not all of my readers are nose pickers.  But you have to admit that when you are in your car, you have this illusion of complete privacy.  Or if not privacy, at least anonymity.  Who cares if a stranger sees you rocking out to Adele.  You’re never going to see the dude in the Camry again, so who cares if he catches you unrolling the ho-ho and licking the cream filling out?  But then it happens.  Somebody at work or at your book club or in art class says, “Hey, I saw you at a stop light the other day!”  If you’re like me, you immediately wonder if you were picking your nose when they saw you.

4.  When you get your hair cut and the barber/stylist removes the cape, you immediately sit up straighter and suck in your gut.

I don’t know about you (actually I do, which is the whole point of this post) but when I’m getting a haircut, I spend an awful lot of time adjusting my look and posture.  That big-ass mirror causes me to be microscopically aware of every brow furrow, every nod, where I’m looking, who I’m looking at, and which body part of who I’m looking at that I’m looking at.  Take an insecure dude and plop him in a chair in front of a giant mirror.  Watch him squirm.  The giant cape is a blessing.  The one thing I don’t worry about is my belly.  Or my hands. Or my arms.  Or my legs or knees.  Doesn’t matter how or where those awkward body parts are, because nobody can see.  Until that one moment.  Usually, there is warning – whether we choose to take the warning or not – there is that signal that the haircut is over when the barber/stylist swings you around and puts the hand mirror up so you can see the back.  That’s the signal that the haircut is over.  But I’m still shocked every time she whips the cape off.  And then I am exposed. Awkward hands and relaxed belly and all.  So I do what we all do.  What I know you have done.  I sit up a little straighter and I suck it in.  I asked my stylist about it.  Asked if she ever noticed the straightening and the sucking.  She said that, as hard as it might be to believe, she is not typically paying attention to my belly, as she is normally focused on the hair on my head.