Single-Tasking

I had a sudden awareness today that I had no idea what I was wearing. I had met a friend for coffee, and we were so intensely in conversation, that I became completely unaware of how I looked.
 
Though there are days when I agonize over my clothing choices in the morning (often in the dark, so as not to wake anyone in my apartment prematurely), I have a feeling there are many days when I experience this phenomenon. I become so engrossed in work or conversation or both, that I genuinely forget (until I'm taking off the clothes at night) what it is that people have been seeing me in all day.
 
One could argue that this means I am not putting my best foot forward. I choose to believe that I am actually putting my best head forward--being there, completely, in whatever I am doing, whether it's a conversation with a friend or a task at work. Am I this single-minded all the time? Absolutely not. The realization that I had today about not remembering my outfit doesn't happen every day. The point is, we can multi-task with the pros, but if we can't also have focus enough for each task, what do we really accomplish?
 
The feeling I had today was largely a tribute to the power of friendship, and how friendship can make all the exterior stuff disappear. But it was also a reminder that single-tasking, whether in work or in life, is a worthwhile goal--sometimes, perhaps, even more worthwhile than its "multi-" partner.