Meet Procrastination's Dark Twin: Precrastination

Hi, my name is Chris, and I am a precrastinator.

Not a procrastinator, who is a person who puts off tasks until the last minute. Rather, I am that person’s opposite, somebody gets things done quickly, sometimes at the expense of quality. Hence, “pre” instead of “pro.”

The term “precrastinator” came into vogue five years ago, around the time that researchers at Pennsylvania State University were studying “walking and reaching,” according to a Scientific American article by Mark Fischetti.

As is often the case in research, the primary goal led to secondary discoveries. In this case, professor David Rosenbaum, experimenting with people carrying ice buckets from one end of an alley to another, noted that many people would pick up a bucket close to them, instead of one closer to the end of the alley, even though it meant carrying that bucket farther to complete the task.

The phenomenon of working harder to accomplish a goal just to say it was finished led Rosenbaum to theorize that some people could be precrastinators, rushing to remove tasks from their working memory.

Anybody who teaches for a living, as I do, will attest to the reality of precrastination. While students who wait until the last minute to complete a task are more common — and get all the press, so to speak — teachers also are aware of the yin to their yang, those students who are finished with an assignment before directions have even been given.

As an English teacher, I see this most often with essay tests. No matter how strongly I stress thoughtful, detailed responses and good time management, somebody is almost always done in five minutes, usually bragging about how “easy” the prompt was.

While that speed and braggadocio can be attributed to a lack of interest in the task, some instances, I belatedly realize, could be precrastination. Students want to be done so badly that they are willing to sacrifice quality.

I get it.

As an incorrigible maker of to-do lists — on paper and in various apps — nothing gives me more satisfaction than crossing off an activity or moving it to the “done” column. And when I finish a job that I forgot to put on my list, I’m not above adding it just so I can immediately put a line through it, even though I recognize this as ridiculous.

The last item on many of my lists is “make tomorrow’s list,” and I’ve marred otherwise lovely, loafing days by tallying minor tasks that I should do so that, on some theoretical tomorrow, I will have nothing to accomplish.

Of course, that tomorrow never comes, because it dawns with a list of its own.

The “precrastinator” designation gives me a label to hang on this behavior. It also explains my zeal to complete tasks that are vapid and inconsequential, both at home and at work, the real-life equivalents of TPS reports from the movie “Office Space.”

(Note to self: I need to add “rewatching Office Space” to my to-do list.)

In my case, I am offloading my working memory twice — once to the list, and then again when I remove it from the list. It’s double satisfaction.

Just as Rosenbaum theorized, it’s also extra work. I have time invested in making lists, along with time to accomplish many inconsequential tasks that could be done later — or never. Often, I need to go back to more important tasks and redo them because I rushed through them the first time.

To say nothing of the mental angst involved whenever I choose to ignore items on my list or when I wake up in the middle of the night thinking about what I still have to do.

Precrastination. It’s not just for breakfast anymore.

Step one in solving any problem is admitting you have one. Next is to decide how to deal with it.

I could start by picking one day a week when I will not make any lists.

That’s a good goal. I’m going to add it to my to-do list.

Damn.

Originally published on Thursday, June 20, 2019, in The Alliance Review. 

Stepping Off for a Straight Pride Parade

Have you seen the Straight Pride flag? 

It’s black and white — because gays, those greedy devils, have already claimed all the other colors of the rainbow for their own flag — with the traditional symbols of Mars and Venus at the center. 

The Straight Pride flag is also very boring, as befits a cause that is similarly boring. 

During June, which is Gay Pride Month, a handful of dingdongs ... excuse me, very concerned citizens, has decided that July needs to be Straight Pride month. Apparently, they feel their rights are being trampled by the many LGBTQ demonstrations in cities around the country and world. 

As a straight man, maybe I should join the straight pride movement. After all, how fair is it that being straight has never gotten me a parade? 

Hmmm. 

Let me tell you some other things that being straight has never gotten me. 

It’s never gotten me shot or lynched. 

It’s never gotten me made fun of in school. 

It’s never gotten me harassed by police. 

Or denied housing. 

Or cried over by a parent. 

Or told I couldn’t marry the person I loved. 

Or subjected to shock treatment. 

Or thrown out of the military. 

Or discriminated against at work. 

Or made the butt of jokes on TV. 

Or prayed for by people who claim to love the sinner and hate the sin but who would be overjoyed if I could somehow change the essence of my being. 

I guess, given all these things that being straight has never gotten me, I can accept that I’ve never had a parade. 

Or haven’t I? 

It is fair to say that heteronormative values have been celebrated in this country and around the world for centuries. 

They’re celebrated every time a man and a woman marries. 

Every time a child is raised along traditional gender lines. 

Every time male and female actors lock lips on the big screen and the audience sighs. 

Every time a picture is snapped of a prom king and queen. 

Every time we can walk down the street holding hands without some jerk in a car doing a double take and looking in the rearview mirror. 

Every time we don’t have any doubts about safely using a public restroom. 

Every time we are accepted, without question, by friends and family who understand and “get” us. 

These are the Straight Pride parades that heterosexual people march in, the ones that step off each morning when our feet hit the floor beside our bed. 

Heterosexual people don’t need a special day or month or flag because we don’t face the same hurdles that gay people do. Because straight accomplishments have never been scrubbed and sanitized out of history books. Because the world doesn’t look at being straight as a psychological illness that can be cured with a little — or a lot — of effort. 

Maybe, someday, LGBTQ people won't need a special month or flag either. 

But the world isn't there yet. 

And as long as people keep having dumb, knee-jerk reactions like Straight Pride Month, it never will be. 

Originally published in The Alliance Review on Thursday, June 13, 2019. 

Boy Scouts organization loses a funding caterpillar

By CHRIS SCHILLIG
The Review

     "Be prepared" is the motto of the Boy Scouts of America. Surely its national leaders remembered those words as they prepped for backlash from a recent decision to admit openly gay scouts while maintaining a ban on gay adults.
     As a result of the policy change, some conservative churches severed ties with the organization. Then last week, Caterpillar Inc. confirmed it was no longer donating to the Scouts. While the company didn't explicitly reference BSA's continued prohibition against gay adults, it did cite the organization's discriminatory practices.
     The Scouts, it seems, just can't win. If the organization had maintained its policy against all homosexuals, it would have pleased many fundamentalists and conservatives while invoking the ire of social activists, including adult Eagle Scouts who have returned badges in protest of past discrimination. Had it dropped the ban against homosexuals in leadership roles, it risked alienating a substantial part of its base while potentially winning over more progressive firms, like Caterpillar.
     Instead, it chose a middle road, one that rankles as much as pleases.
     In recent years, America has experienced a seismic shift in attitudes toward homosexuality. Nowhere is that more apparent than an annual poll by the National Opinion Research Center. In 1973, more than seven out of 10 Americans felt homosexual relationships were "always wrong," a number that dropped to a little more than four in 10 in 2010. Last month, half of Americans responding to a Gallup poll said gay marriages should be recognized as valid, up from 27 percent in 1996.
     That 50-percent mark is a challenge for organizations like the Scouts, who balance conservative values with relevance in today's world. Last month's policy change bought them time, but as Caterpillar's funding pull illustrated, not very much.
     Many Americans are at the same point with sexual orientation today as they were with interracial relationships a few decades ago. The last refuge of the bigot on the interracial issue was to play the "child card." Interracial relationships might be OK, this line of reasoning went, but what about the children of such relationships? They will have such a hard time fitting in.
Critics play a modified version of the "child card" with homosexual scouts: It will be too hard to integrate them with straight scouts; they will be singled out; they will be teased.
     Doubtful. Most kids these days are very accepting of homosexuality. In the youngest age group measured by Gallup, the 18-34 range, 70 percent support gay marriage. Sexual-orientation may be a big deal to adults, but it isn't to their kids.
     The Boy Scouts' decision reminds me of a scene from "The Great Debaters." In the film, Denzel Washington's character tells his all-black team that they have been invited to debate Oklahoma City University. One team member questions why the debate will be off-campus, to which Washington responds, "Because sometimes … you have to take things one step at a time."
     The Boy Scouts of America are doing just that. The decision to allow gay scouts opens doors that were formerly closed, eliminating a noxious version of the "don't ask, don't tell" policy. It gives the group an opportunity to educate the public and paves the way for the day when these young scouts will become adults and want to continue their association. At that point, the organization will have no choice but to modify policy again and remove the last of its discriminatory practices.
     Delaying that policy change keeps many qualified, compassionate adults from sharing their time and talents with scouts, and that's a shameful waste of human capital. But, sometimes, you have to take things one step at a time.
     Let's hope all the organization's Caterpillars won't turn into butterflies and flutter away to other charities in the meantime.

     chris.schillig@yahoo.com

     @cschillig on Twitter

Correcting the infallible

By CHRIS SCHILLIG
The Alliance Review

A few weeks ago, Pope Francis suggested that atheists could get to heaven on the basis of good deeds alone.

For many people, it was an indication that the Catholic Church was changing its stance and becoming more open and accepting. They were wrong.

The Vatican quickly issued a statement that contradicted the supposedly infallible pope. A spokesman noted that people who are ignorant of the gospels and the church could, indeed, pass through the eye of a needle and enter the kingdom of heaven, like the camel of proverb. Apparently, it's not their fault if the church's PR department didn't find them.

But people with an awareness of the Catholic Church "cannot be saved [if they] refuse to enter her or remain in her," said the Rev. Thomas Rosica, as quoted by United Press International.

In other words, a person like me, who has turned away from Catholicism and, indeed, all religion, will still roast in perpetual flames, while those who have accepted the gospels and Christ will enjoy the fruits of heaven.

But if I believe all this eternal-life-after-death stuff is bunk anyway, then why do I care what the pope, the cardinals, the bishops or anybody else believes? The truth is, I don't, not really.

But the pope's statement was a concession that many roads exist to reach a common destination, which is helpful to many people who have left one faith to join another, but who still are wracked with guilt because of earlier indoctrination. It is also a comfort to the faithful who worry over the souls of atheists in their families. (Hi, Mom.)

Additionally, the pope's words made me hopeful that we'd moved one tiny step closer to the day when all people could live without the divisiveness of religion, helping one another without the presence of some invisible being who holds out the promise of eternal reward or punishment.

We're not quite there, but we are advancing. Last August, "The Global Index of Religiosity and Atheism" showed that the number of Americans who identified themselves as religious had dropped from 73 to 60 percent since 2005, while the number of Americans who say they are atheists increased from 1 to 5 percent.

Slow progress, but progress nonetheless.

Whenever I write about religion (much less frequently than my critics believe), I receive a lot of mail. Sometimes readers say they will pray for me, sometimes that they will never read my column again, and sometimes that they will do both simultaneously.

Less often, readers agree with me, but when I ask if they'd be willing to have their comments published as letters to the editor, they almost always decline. Too controversial, they say. They have to work and live in this town, they say.

Such is the power of organized religion. I write for a newspaper that devotes two pages a week to positive portrayals of organized faith (and with two columnists whose work I enjoy), yet many cry foul when I look at religion critically two or three times a year.

For the record, I have nothing against people of faith in general or Catholics in particular. Some of the best people I know are both. I no longer share or understand their beliefs or reasoning, much as they don't share or understand mine, but that makes dinner parties more interesting, you know?

And I really like Pope Francis. He appears to be a man of compassion, a true shepherd for his flock, more concerned with a message of universal love than with the preservation of the church's hierarchy and rather arbitrary rules.

Unfortunately, the same can't be said for his handlers, who took his New Testament message of acceptance and covered it with a heaping helping of Old Testament judgment.

His way stood at least a chance of reaching the disenfranchised. Theirs, not so much.

chris.schillig@yahoo.com

@cschillig on Twitter

Originally published June 6, 2013, in The Alliance Review.

A weighty canine problem

We had bad news from our veterinarian last month.

Crossing his arms and rubbing his chin, he did his best Marcus Welby as he groped for a way to deliver the message sensitively.

He nodded toward our 2-year-old golden retriever. Cooper, he said, his voice assuming the gravity of Charlton Heston in "The Ten Commandments," was "tending toward the point of obesity."

"It's OK, Doc," I replied. "We can take it. Just tell us he's fat."

He said Cooper wasn't fat — not yet — but could stand to lose 15 to 20 pounds.

When 15 to 20 pounds represents between 13 to 18 percent of an animal's weight, that's fat, at least to my layperson's way of thinking. Maybe not morbidly obese, but definitely in the I'm-no-longer-a-supermodel category.

The vet rattled off a litany of health problems that can plague fat (excuse me, tending-toward-the-point-of-obesity) dogs: joint pain, hip dysplasia, heart problems and diabetes.

(Diabetes, by the way, must be pronounced the way Wilford Brimley does in those commercials for free testing supplies: die-uh-BEAT-us.)

My wife, always the loving mother, rationalized faster than a chocoholic at a Weight Watchers meeting. "He's just big-boned," she said. Yeah, and denial is just a river in Egypt.

"And he likes his treats," she continued, referring to the economy-sized box of dog bones that we refill every week or two. "When he's a good boy, he gets a bone."

My wife's definition of "good boy" was synonymous with "breathing boy." Whatever the dog did, he got a bone — go outside, bark at cats, look at her adorably, jump on furniture after we told him to get down. He received a bone when she left for work in the morning (to quell separation anxiety, she said) and another when she came home (to celebrate a joyous reunion).

In retrospect, his weight gain should have been obvious. Just a week before, we'd ordered a custom-made harness when his no longer fit. "Custom-made" reminds me of the pair of Levi's with a size 76 waist that hung in a downtown clothing store for so many years.

Poor Cooper, it seems, has joined the ranks of the 36.7 million dogs in this country -- a fur-bristling 52.5 percent -- who are overweight, according to the Association for Pet Obesity Prevention. (And just the existence of such an organization might say all that needs to be said about America.)

APOP believes the causes of pet obesity are the same as the causes of human obesity: More calories coming in than going out. We eat too much junk (or maybe too much, period) and don't exercise enough. Our animals do the same.

But fixing a dog's obesity is much easier than fixing a person's, especially since a dog doesn't have opposable thumbs to open a cookie jar, can't make a late night run to Taco Bell for Fourth Meal and can't break the padlock off a refrigerator door.

It's a simple prescription: If your dog's fat, stop feeding him so much and take him around the block a few times a day.

In the weeks since we learned Cooper was "tending toward the point of obesity," we've virtually eliminated treats (my wife still has to give him a bone when she leaves for work — it's practically a tradition). We've also cut out the little ice cream cones from Dairy Queen, pizza crusts and any other "people" food.

Now that the weather's nicer, we're walking him farther than just the stop sign on the corner, going instead to the park and putting some miles on those pork-chop legs. He comes home exhausted, but guess what? He's losing weight faster than Obama's losing credibility.
Maybe Cooper's not quite ready for an American Kennel Club photo shoot, but at least he's stopped waddling and jiggling like a Walmart shopper in pajama pants.

"It's been rough," he says over the fence to the neighbor dog, a rail-thin Great Dane. "But at least I'm not a statistic anymore. Did you know that 62.7 percent of golden retrievers surveyed were overweight? It's an epidemic."

Like most empty nesters, my wife and I expend far too much time and energy creating a rich fantasy world where our dog watches TV, checks email, makes phone calls and talks like a baby.
Pathetic, isn't it?

Almost as sad as a world where a dog's weight has to be spoken of in euphemisms, for fear we'll offend.

"Tending toward the point of obesity," indeed.

chris.schillig@yahoo.com
@cschillig on Twitter

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