Out the Window

It’s a funny expression used when something is a waste: All that hard work is now out the window. I started thinking about things that had literally been thrown out the window while on a run a few weeks ago. Over the six-mile course I caught glimpses of an apple core, a smashed USB cord, several aluminum beer cans, a sock, a bag from MacDonald’s, and a package of unopened string cheese. The string cheese made me laugh as I imagined a tot in high dudgeon and unamused by his parent’s attempt to calm him with a morsel. He, instead, flung it out the window.

My son liked to throw things, too. But he didn’t have to be in a temper to suddenly take the notion to hurl whatever object he had in his hand. I particularly recall a time while in Florida visiting my parents. Dad was driving his van, Mom was in the passenger seat, and I was with the kids in the center row. Mom was keeping a close watch on the road helping Dad drive when she jerked her head around and excitedly asked, “What was that?”

I looked up and said, “What was what?”

“Len, stop the car,” Mom ordered. In that same moment my son began wailing and pointing his finger at the open window next to him. Dad was thoroughly confused, as was I, about why Mom was insisting we stop.

Mom’s eagle eyes had seen an object fly by her window, bounce off the pavement, and ricochet off to the side of the road. “I think Aaron just threw his ball out the window,” she said. His now loud sobs and pointing finger seemed to confirm that suspicion. And so we stopped. We were quite the curiosity for passersby as we searched along a quarter mile stretch for that ball. We found it, which put an immediate stop to the crying. Dad promptly rolled up the windows and hit the window lock button before we continued on.

Out the window in the case of the thrown ball is easy to understand, but why did we ever start saying “out the window” when something was a waste? I did a little research and found all kinds of references to the expression and a fascinating explanation about defenestration, but nothing that could truly explain the usage.

I suppose the closest I can come to understanding the expression is when thinking back to the return trip from a local carnival with my grandparents when I was five years old. In the car, Mom and Dad were upfront, and I was snuggled between Grandma and Grandpa in the back. I tightly held the treasured helium balloon that had been purchased for me. I gazed up at it with fascination. Grandma even said, “You like that balloon, I suppose?” I did like it and was a bit in shock that I had been given such a wondrous thing.

We stopped at an A&W Root Beer drive-in for dinner. I ordered a hotdog with ketchup and a Baby Mug. Grandma rolled down her window just enough so that when the carhop brought the tray, there was a place to hook it on to. Grandma busied herself with handing out the food and everyone began eating. As I undid the wrapping to my hotdog I momentarily forgot about the balloon. In an instant, the string unfurled from my wrist and the balloon zipped out the window and headed toward the sky. Now that truly was a waste.

Copyright DJ Anderson, 2015