I banged my fist on my desk and muttered “I haven’t got all day.” But my computer ignored me and struggled to load the rest of my page. I had been fidgeting in my seat for almost five minutes until my computer burped and then locked up.
The screen, which displayed only half of my document, was mocking me now. But I didn't give up. Maybe I could fix it, I thought. I opened the task manager and closed all of the running applications. No response. I tried to open a diagnostic program. No dice.
Finally, I sighed and admitted that the battle had been lost. Now, there was only one thing left to do.
CTRL-ALT-DEL
I rebooted. Five minutes later I was back in business and running smoothly. My computer, it appears simply needed a little break to gather itself together and get going again.
I could relate.
These past couple of weeks have been hectic. I spent a week in Erie, Pennsylvania with the kids and without Ken. It was fun, but exhausting. A few days later, I was on a train to Chicago for a business trip. No sooner had I returned from that trip when Emily got sick. Ken and I didn’t get much sleep for a couple of days and spent a number of hours getting blood work and x-rays (long story but she is much better now).
About this time I found myself envying my computer. When it gets overwhelmed, it just refuses to process any more information. It forces itself to shut down and then, after it rests, it starts over.
A reboot button would certainly come in handy in my life. I could use it when Beth starts throwing a temper tantrum because I put cheesy broccoli on her plate. I could use it after I’ve been up all night fretting over Emily’s fever. I could use it when I forgot that Eric has soccer practice and a Boy Scout meeting on the same day.
Unfortunately, I have a flawed system design and there is no reboot button for my day to day life. I guess that means I’ll just muddle through until the weekend when I can sleep late and enjoy a few quite moments.
In the meantime, don’t ask me too many questions as you are likely to receive an “Error 404 – File Not Found” as a response.
Photo of computer per this site: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:IBM_PC_5150.jpg
