This adorable baby knows how ridiculous it is to live life by the coin.
When I first started dating Dave, I thought the coin flip was a quirky thing he did to pick his order at restaurants in a way that would make the server laugh. I soon learned it was more than that. The moment I fully realized how important the coin flip was to him was when I walked into his apartment to hear him chanting, “flip the coin! Flip the coin!” to our friend who was deciding where to go to grad school. Any decision that leaves Dave even marginally unsure of what to do, he will immediately try to solve with the coin. And he will follow the coin’s decision blindly.
The coin flip is only useful in the way that any exercise that makes something definitive is useful. Let me explain. Let’s say you are twelve and your mom asks you if you want macaroni and cheese for dinner or if you’d like to order pizza. You say you don’t really care. But when you see your mom pull out the pot to boil water, one of two things will happen: either that pizza starts sounding really good and you rush to grab the phone before your mom puts the pasta in that pot and your shot at pizza is blown, or you become content with the prospect of macaroni and cheese for dinner and you wait calmly until she calls you to the table. The mom is the decision maker for indecisive twelve year olds. The coin flip is the decision maker for indecisive grown-ups. After the coin hits the surface, there’s a good chance you will know what you were actually hoping for.
The coin flip brings out your gut feelings when you didn’t know you had any. And I’m all for following your gut.
So if the coin helps you come to a decision, that’s great. But if you realize you aren’t happy with the decision the coin made, go against it. Do not let a little metal thing with some dead president’s face on it dictate what you will do with your life. Put it in its place and use it for some gumballs or an arcade game instead.
Dave might argue that it’s silly to waste all your brainpower making unimportant decisions. Fine. I will cede that you can thoughtlessly use the coin for some mundane things, if it’s helpful to you. Here I have included a brief list of example predicaments and divided them into those which can be safely decided by the coin and those which you should employ logic for.
| OK to use the coin | Not OK to use the coin |
|---|---|
| What movie should I see? | Where should I invest my life savings? |
| What should I make for lunch? | C-section or natural birth? |
| What clothes should I wear today? | Should I wear clothes today? |
There is, however, a perk to dating someone who believes so unwaveringly in the power of the coin and fears horrible repercussions should he disobey it. Things that I want to do that I have 0% chance of getting Dave to do with me suddenly become things that I have a 50% chance shot at if I involve the coin. In this way, I have gotten Dave to do a number of things including:
• Watch Rent.
• Eat at a vegetarian restaurant that plays strange music that scares the bajeezus out of him.
• Go to poetry readings.
I have also been given a free pass on ordering a super girly drink at the bar because I had Dave flip a coin on what I should order.
Thus, while I don’t believe in the power of the coin, I sometimes embrace Dave’s belief in it. But as for me, my decision maker is a spongy mass of cells and tissue. It’s called my brain.
Clara's New Laugh by Mitch Bennett is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.
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