Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

Life in convenienc­e

More than one way to save time

- BILL RAUSCH SPECIAL TO THE DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE Bill Rausch is a freelance writer from Little Rock. Email him at williamrau­sch25@ yahoo.com.

Convenienc­e. In our overschedu­led lives laden with kids’ soccer, project deadlines, kids’ band practice, business meetings, kids’ dance lessons, flights to catch, kids’ Taekwondo lessons, hurry-up suppers, kids’ gymnastics, shopping, and kids’ after-school activities, surviving is all about convenienc­e. Did you ever ask yourself how convenient life would be if, years ago, we had made more informed decisions not to have all those dang little distractio­ns in our lives?

Of course I’m talking about all those meetings and deadlines.

Just imagine how less hectic our lives would be without all those extraneous job details that interfere with our real life. How our kids could be the center of our universe. How we could focus all of our thoughts, energies, and every spare moment and every spare dollar on only them. Hey, wait a minute—we already do that.

But how many of us would give up so much as even one precious, family-bonding minute of the endless hours we spend driving to soccer games, driving to band practice, driving to gymnastics, driving to school activities, and driving to kids’ parties only to sit in a cold, damp car or on a cold, damp sideline bench.

Okay, you all can put your hands down now. I know you are just kidding. Right?

Convenienc­e. That is how we counter the inexorable tugs and pulls of a hectic life. If we can’t avoid it or eliminate it, at least we can try to make it more convenient.

One of the best tools for making our frenzied family lifestyle manageable is an old trick invented by early settlers: carpooling. Or, as it was referred to back then—buggypooli­ng. Multi-family buggypooli­ng didn’t gain a lot of traction initially since most settlers’ families were of Duggeresqu­e proportion­s. Mega-families were de

rigueur— kids were considered an essential source of free labor.

After Mr. and Mrs. Settler loaded all 12 or 14 kids (they would oftentimes lose count) into the buggy for Taekwondo lessons, there were no spare seats to buggypool. Early versions of the SUV, called “hay wagons” (crude by today’s standards, but better looking), alleviated the situation somewhat. As hay wagons grew in size, the manufactur­ers added more features and accessorie­s. One of the earliest accessorie­s that some enterprisi­ng hay wagon manufactur­er in Des Moines developed was seats. Before long, hay wagons could comfortabl­y transport 16 to 20 kids. In contrast, today’s lumbering SUVs usually transport a mommy, a daddy and two kids.

Convenienc­e. It has been a part of our lives for a long time. As many of you know, Joanne and I have paid our dues. Our kids are raised. Well, almost. If we could just get them to stop coming home with all of their kids every dang weekend. Free babysittin­g is the opiate of new parents.

But in spite of our (mostly) empty nest, convenienc­e still plays an important part in our lives. While we are no longer endlessly chauffeuri­ng (that’s French for “shuffling”) our kids, we still flit about our fair city in a frenetic flurry. Even though our needs have, shall we say, “matured,” we can’t seem to break our lifelong pattern of making daily sojourns to Wal-Mart.

Recently, in an attempt to make our lives less hectic we decided to seek the convenienc­e of living closer to the big-box behemoth. We scoured the real estate ads in magazines, newspapers, and online. We wanted something that would possibly afford us the opportunit­y to simply walk to the Wal-Mart. Would that be suburban Valhalla or what?

To our amazement, many real estate ads include the distance between their listings and the nearest Wal-Mart. It’s right there with all of the sundry amenities: three bedrooms, two baths, WBFP (whatever the heck that is … maybe a radio station in Philadelph­ia?), double garage, wet bar, media room (whatever the heck that is) and in bold letters: ONLY FIVE MINUTES FROM WALMART.

We just couldn’t seem to find the right house. Invariably, we’d see one that was exactly what we were looking for, but too far from the hallowed halls of retail bliss. Or it was mere blocks away but crypticall­y termed a “fixer-upper.” At my age, all I want is my uppers fixed. We stayed in the hunt for a long time. We completely exhausted two real estate agents. Everything they showed us was too ostentatio­us, too far away, too rundown or too expensive. One day we went to two too-expensive listings. They completely blew out our budget. Apparently $85,000 just isn’t what it used to be.

Then it hit me. A brilliant plan. I rushed down to the courthouse to examine the property records of recent real estate transactio­ns. It only took a few hours and I found it.

Several acres on the edge of town had recently sold to some surreptiti­ous Wal-Mart real estate buyer using the name Wally-World Inc. LLC. And right next to it, adjacent to the projected 7,500-car parking lot was an empty parcel. Inexplicab­ly not already snapped up by some parasitic retail developer. Still for sale. Cheap.

Our dreams were answered. We bought the vacant land and will begin constructi­on on our little bungalow as soon as the Wal-Mart parking lot is paved. Our front door will open right onto it. We will be able to walk there as many times a day as we please.

Well, assuming some SUV doesn’t block our front door.

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