Am I Missing Something?

When did we start to “reach out” to everyone about everything? My financial guy whom I have known for years, no longer calls me, talks to me, or emails me. He “reaches out” to me. An old friend is coming to Fairfield and she emails a group of us and says she wants to “reach out” to us all about getting together. (No offense, J.) One of my sons emailed me and thanked me for “reaching out,” when I mailed a sympathetic email to his wife.

Since when did “reaching out” become the go-to words for wanting to talk to someone?

I’ve been thinking about the “reaching out” I do in my life and it is physical. I reach out to catch the falling box of blueberries, praying that it won’t hit the floor thereby causing me to be on my hands and knees for an hour searching for those suckers under the fridge and the stove and the table in the kitchen. Some more reaching out, particularly under the table, may be required. Blueberries, I have discovered from past reaching out failures, hit the floor with an explosive force that flings them all over the place.

Sailing a boat, I reach out for a line thrown to me that I must quickly wrap around a cleat or take some grief from my skipper.

I reach out with both arms to grab the sheets I have washed that are flapping wildly in the wind on the clothesline behind my English cottage.

What am I missing here? This is not a trick question; I am serious.

I remember one summer in England having dinner with friends and the host was telling me a story in which he said, with a knowing and self-satisfied smile, “It goes on 24/7, as you Americans always say.”

Whoops! Clearly I am supposed to know what this means. I had to think a second: 24/7. Hmm. Ah. OK. That means twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. I nodded and smiled, acknowledging with my eyes how hip he was---withholding how hip I wasn’t-- and the conversation smoothly continued.

24/7 has become a part of my vocabulary. Maybe “reaching out” will too? The jury is still out.