They Are From Mars, I Am From Soap Opera

I send emails while cooking dinner and putting together the elements my kids will need for their school lunches.

I follow up with insurance companies and service vendors and old friends while on a break from work.

I check for updates while riding the train or the bus from home to work and work to home, no matter what hour.

Some might call it multitasking. I also call it "soap brain." For, while some might argue that soaps were a habit that could turn a brain to mush, the production of soaps required superior expertise in multitasking before multitasking was even a word. How else would 60 scenes a day or multiple episodes a week or costume changes to cover 7 show days happen? How else would timing and shot selection and performance notes happen simultaneously?

It is quite possible that I had "soap brain"--the production version--long before I worked in soaps, and that soaps simply used and honed my skills. But when I do more than I should be able to in a certain number of hours, I thank the soaps. When I can clearly see what happened yesterday and two weeks ago, along with what's happening today and what will happen next month, I thank the soaps. When I am able to handle people and pictures and numbers all at the same time, I thank the soaps.

It's not that I'm smarter or quicker or more talented (some days, maybe I am, some days, maybe I'm not). It's just that I have soap brain. After all, they may be from Mars. But I am from soap opera.