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Stuart Revercomb

Stuart Revercomb is a marketing consultant and joyously married father of four children. He seems to remember someone once telling him he ought to be a writer. "The Unseen Here and Now" -- Thursdays.

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"Thursday's Fare"

The ad first caught my attention not because of the cluttered refrigerator door that looked so much like ours, but rather for the dog that was pictured in the bottom left hand corner. There was no mistake about it. It was our dog. It was the "Ab Dog."

Abbey had clearly been on the lam. Somehow she had found her way to Madison Ave. and pawned herself off as some sort of "model dog." I could only hope she had done it for noble reasons, like buying the family a special Christmas present this year, or paying me back for all those meals I've given her.

After all, she's about 72 in dog years and probably should've been out of the house long ago.

I've talked to her several times about the picture, even showing it to her and demanding an explanation, but so far mum's the word. Maybe it's a Christmas surprise after all.

At least it wasn't an ad for lingerie or some such thing.

What she had apparently been chosen to promote was an Internet appliance created by 3Com called "Audrey." According to 3Com, Audrey is "the first digital home assistant" -- an "online family organizer" that can do all the things the surface of your refrigerator can. Such as take those notes and invitations and pictures and drawings and magnets and stickers and children's artwork and bills and calendars and pizza phone numbers and everything else that seems to have no place else to go but somehow needs to be visible, and put them all nice and neat and digital in a little white box for "easy reference."

It looks like this :

A far cry from what your refrigerator looks like, huh?

But a little sterile, isn't it.

If the kitchen is the heart of a house, then the refrigerator is the heart of the kitchen. All good things tend to come from the fridge. I often go to it just for comfort. I'll open the picture and note plastered door and just stare, half hoping something among the contents will call my name, "Hey, Stuart, over here ... second shelf, on the left -- yeah -- leftover chicken pot pie -- great with cold milk ... let's go."

And I usually do.

But as 3Com's ad inadvertently points out, it's the scramble of artifacts on the door that is the real treasure of the average refrigerator. There, in one cluttered horizontal conflagration, is the better part of our lives, both past and future. Only the very best pictures warrant refrigerator status, becoming testimonies to our happiest times with family and friends. The notes and reminders point to upcoming occasions, some of which will surely produce more pictures that will take the place of those already there.

Along with the trinkets, souvenirs, quotes and "artwork," they softly speak of what is most important to us.

Whenever I'm at a party at someone's house, the kitchen invariably hosts the better part of it, and if given the chance, I always peruse the refrigerator door. It sounds nosey, I know, and in many ways it probably is, but I don't think anyone posts anything on their refrigerator door that's not deemed safe for public consumption.

It provides a look into someone's life that you rarely get otherwise.

I'd hate to be standing around someone's kitchen with a glass of their wine in my hand and have to say, "Hey, can I have a quick look in the little white box there ... I'm just dying to know more about who you are ... What's the password?"

I think I'd rather just inspect those pictures a little closer under the pretense of going for more ice.

So if you're thinking about digitizing your life further, to the point of reducing your refrigerator door to a monolith of shimmering white metal, don't forget that all those people -- from extended family, to repairmen, to guests at your next soiree -- will have no better way to know you beyond what's on the mantle or the back of the toilet.

And it may be that much harder, as well, for you to "know" yourself. For the "museums" that are our refrigerators are more mirror than window -- reflecting to us not only the busy details of our lives, but the very best of our joys and hopes. It's OK if they're a bit of a mess. We are, too, for that matter.

Maybe that's why hiding it all neatly away seems a little less than genuine.

Thanks "Audrey," but I'll take the "ice box" over a digital one any day.