Stephen Yeargin

Recycling requires a lot of effort. At least, it does if you live outside the USD (urban services district) in Nashville. Choosing to live in Goodlettsville (straddles on the county line) means that we must take our recyclables to a drop-off center located throughout the city. Our local option is in Rivergate, but they recently made the decision to only have it open during regular business hours. For us working stiffs, the Rivergate center might as well not exist.

We always put it off. Our newspapers, cardboard, Coke cans, bottles and pizza boxes stack up in our laundry room in totes until we eventually decide that we are not acrobatic enough to get over the pile to put in a load of whites. Even still, it usually waits until the weekend so that we can run all of our errands without wasting a lot of time or gas.

After 30 minutes or so of pre-sorting (it goes much faster that way), I started looking for a hat. I used to wear ball caps all of the time in college, but since starting a more professional career I have all but abandoned the familiar head wear. Weekends are an exception. I spent another 10 or 15 minutes looking for the hat my wife picked up from the Nashville Sounds game, but the search turned up fruitless. I went to the closet and grabbed one from work.

On the car ride over, we talked a little about how our lives were feeling very routine and how I was missing the level of spontaneity and excitement that I had grown accustomed to as a college student. Even with such a profound identification of a central theme of angst and anxiousness, it is not something easily resolved.

We dropped off the recycling, grabbed lunch and headed home. I walked into our office and without thinking tossed my hat on to the couch, where it neatly landed behind the throw pillow and slid down the side of the cushion.

… right on top of my missing hat.