A few weeks ago I bought hair styling products at my local Whole Foods.  I asked about their return policy, because so often I buy things that do not work for me at all and then I am stuck with it.  The helpful staff assured me that they do take the products back, even if you have used it, with a receipt. Great!  I chose products from the line of shampoo and conditioner that I have been using lately.  My naturally wavy curl isn’t super frizzy, but isn’t so sleek either. It is hard for me to find a product that does just what I want, add some shine, smooth out the frizz, but still let my follicles be their bouncy selves, without weighing them down.  I have finally embraced my curls and my natural color after years of straightening and coloring, now I just want a little help!

The products haven’t been doing much for me.  Really, they didn’t do anything, except maybe dry it out.  I decided today I would go return them, I mean I can use that money for groceries and they aren’t helping my unwieldy curls at all.  Usually I keep receipts that I may need for returns or proof of purchase in my wallet.   So, I assumed it would be tucked safely there, even though I had made the purchase a while ago.  There was no sign of it, though!  I checked the box of random bits that I keep on my desk, nope not there either.  Oh, no!  This means that it must be in the huge, overflowing, double-stuffed manila envelope that is in my closet.  The envelope that I have stuffed every single receipt into since January 1^st!  Every Kombucha that I have purchased, every piece of home goods for my studio, every post office receipt for mail that I have sent!  Every single one!

This envelope has been staring at me for a while.  It wants to be organized!  I just keep stuffing more receipts in!  For the past 6 years, I have kept most of my receipts for tax purposes, and this year I have chosen to save every last one of them!  Who knows what this year will hold?  I may publish a book, or create something huge!  Everything that I have done this year is a part of that, it is all my inspiration, it is all my homework.  I will be able to write off every last bit of it!

So, I started to slowly pluck receipts from the top, looking for the one with the hair products on it.  No luck!  All right, I am into it.  I might as well organize it.  So, I dump the whole thing out on my bed and go to work unbunching them and compiling piles of similar purchases to be grouped into separate envelopes.  I have done this for years, so I am used to this method, but this is different.  I am not making a pile of tool receipts that includes headphones, screwdrivers, drills, and sautering metal.  I am creating new types of piles.  I make a pile for groceries, as it is research for a future cookbook.  I am making it all up.

I go through the whole pile and do not find the one receipt that started this.  I know that I have not thrown it away, but maybe I did?  I check the front pocket to the grocery bag that I use most often and there it is! The only receipt in there.  AHA!  I do that a lot.  I do things that I make up are very smart, the best possible place to put something to find or use later. Then, when I go to look for it, I have no clue where it could be.  I am grateful that I have outsmarted myself once again, Now, not only do I have the receipt that I want in my hand, I have organized every other receipt in my possession and I am entering them all into Quicken now!

Maybe this was my unintentional intention for the day?

“What we are looking for is what is looking.”