To Find a Tea Kettle

ME: Did you say you were bringing a tea kettle?

PRODUCER: No. You told me you were going to ask the owner for one…do we need one?

ME: We might. I was certain she had one, but I’m not finding it yet…

ME: Yes we do need one. So sorry!

ME: Also, do we have a pill bottle?

That text message conversation between myself and my producer, Rhianna, began 3 hours outside of Chicago, last Wednesday, during our first snowfall of the year. I was on set in a lavishly converted barnhouse having just realized that we lacked the tea kettle that was to play a major part in the scene. I called Rhianna, who was driving herself and the cast to the location to let her know I’d go and fetch one and that she shouldn’t bother.

How hard could it be to find a tea kettle? After all, I was in Warren, IL. Population 1,428.

After ruling out the local Wal-Mart and Target only because “local” meant 45 minutes away, I headed into town.

Truly I didn’t have time to go hunting around a tiny town for props, but the rest of the crew was tied up with the set, so off I went. I tried the pharmacy first. I thought surely they’d have a tea kettle. I realized rather quickly that the Warren Drug was not a CVS (although they happily gave me an empty pill bottle after I told them we were making a movie).

The kind ladies at Warren Drug suggested I try Hartzell’s IGA, the grocery store at the edge of town right by the grain elevator. So I did. Hartzell’s was everything you’d hope a small town grocer would be. Family-owned and operated for three generations, friendly as all get out, AND they’ve got their own video store tour which you absolutely must see. While Hartzell’s did have “wide aisles for easy shopping” (see aforementioned video), no tea kettles.

The sweet ladies at the deli counter were sorry I hadn’t found what I was looking for and one even offered up her own personal tea kettle. They suggested I go back into town and try the hardware store. If the hardware store didn’t have one they suggested that, quite possibly, the brick building across the street from the hardware store might be able to help. Apparently, this said unnamed store was owned by a guy named Chuck who sometimes forgets to turn his “open” sign on, and if that was the case, I should look for a red truck out back, which means he’s probably there and asleep, so I should knock loudly.

So…I went back into town and headed for the hardware store. Well wouldn’t you know it, right next to the hardware was a little antique and ceramics shop. I’ll spare you the creepy details of the thousands of unpainted bunnies and gnomes stacked floor to ceiling and simply say that there, tucked in a dusty corner, was a perfect, blue, metal tea kettle. And it was only $3.50. I pulled out my debit card. They only took cash. One more trip across the street to the General Store’s ATM and I was on my way back to the set.

As I settled onto the highway, something nagged at my heart. What could it be? Despite an odd, slightly frustrating, and unexpected trip around a town I’d never been to, I had found everything I was looking for.

And then I saw it.

As I had been racing all around Warren, IL I had been passing staggering amounts of beauty.

But I wasn’t looking for staggering amounts of beauty. I was looking for a tea kettle…and an empty pill bottle.

The feeling arrested me.

So I stopped…(even though I didn’t have time)…looked around…(even though I didn’t have time)…and took a few photos.

As I got back into the car I wondered how often I do this. I’m pulled off a project to go hunt for an unexpected item and consider it a distraction from my original goal. Seth Godin would call these interruptions, “interesting problems,” and when confronted with such obstacles we always have options.

My point?

I simply wonder if all our detours, particularly during our projects, or even in life, aren’t really distractions at all, but rather opportunities for seeing staggering amounts of beauty; for seeing things in ways we hadn’t anticipated.

Too often I think I’m supposed to be looking for one thing, when really I’m supposed to be finding, unearthing, discovering another.

And the only way to find it, or to see it, is to stop and look around.

Even if I don’t have time.