Things I Can't Open
Blister packs: Designed to frustrate any attempt at opening. I’m told they were invented to thwart shoplifters. It would be easier to lift the shop than to open the pack.
Childproof medication bottles: These are much like blister packs but worse. When you detect the first sign of a migraine, it’s time to call your four-year-old for help. Just the thought of having to open one of these bottles will give you a migraine.
Screw caps on wine bottles: One in seven of these tops is welded closed. You must break the bottle or stay sober.
More screw caps: The screw caps on wine bottles when you execute a hasty (desperate?) decision to open one with a corkscrew.
The flimsy little plastic bags food stores still offer for items in the produce section: These bags will not open. It’s physics. Or chemistry. Or static electricity. Strategy? Discreetly lick a thumb and index fingertip. Apply the dampened digits to one side of the bag. If you’re very lucky, it will open. If you’re anyone other than a professional gambler, it will not. Repeat this procedure two or three times, or until a small crowd has gathered. Only when they begin to murmur and some arm themselves with items in the tomato bin, an opening will appear. Don’t go back to this shop for three weeks or until no one can remember the disgusting dude who licked the plastic bags. And remember how tasty canned vegetables can be. (I write this in solidarity with Colonel Sanders, the man who made finger-licking a thing.)
Local newspapers: What local newspapers? Where are they? You can’t open what you can’t find.
Social media: Nope. Dangerous to open these. Fiction masquerades as fact. Mendacity as truth. Scams as charity. Vituperation as debate. Like the childproof medicine cap, all four-year-olds can open social media. But you mustn’t let them.
Donald McMann served as a professor in the English department of MacEwan
University beginning in 2001. Before that, he worked as a communications
practitioner, which involved everything from copywriting and editing to
directing campaigns. Recently he retired from his position at the
university to devote more time to writing. He has a PhD in creative
writing from the University of Wales: Trinity St. David, as well as an
MFA in writing and literature from Bennington College.