I'm watching Hoarders the other day, and the lady says, "I just decided to quit cleaning up after everyone. So I did. I went on strike." Then she chuckles that crazy mom hoarder chuckle and follows up with, "I guess I never came back from the strike." Her strike started 20 years ago. Her kids are grown, married, and live far far away. Her husband is somewhere in the creepy maze of clutter.
I thought to myself, "Wow, that one's crazy." Until today.
The kids are 8 years old, and we've been married for 10 blissful years, and I still haven't solved the ultimate dilemma: To clean up everyone's crap or to not clean up everyone's crap? That is the question.
To clean it up, keeps us all breathing clean air. It keeps CPS from checking on me. It keeps the mold from the floors where my kids leave their wet towels. And it keeps me from breaking my ankle when the kids leave their cars, stuffed animals, shoes, and footballs right at the base of the stairs. Every time. The filth in my house is a health issue. This also provides a point that I'm a stay-at-home mom, cleaning is part of the gig, I suppose. However, I'm kinda a part time worker too. So there. The down side of To Clean Up Everyone's Crap is they never learn to do it themselves. My hope would be that they leave in correct cleanliness and then go off to college and can't stand a filthy room. The reality of that dream is they'd call me over to clean it.
To not clean means I just sit around in vain and wait for someone to do something. And then when they don't, I get Mommy Dearest Wacky on their asses.
That's kind of where I'm at today, once again. Except today, it's been a "To clean up everyone's crap" kinda day. I resolved to get the laundry done, and helped Max organize and clean up his closet. Ricardo is not his usual self and is hanging out on the couch. As it turns out, he's not superhuman, and doesn't even have a uterus. Wait, neither do I. What I'm getting at is this isn't his normal gig, so I opt to go along with it. I consider his rigorous schedule of working full-time while making straight A's in grad school. And each time I pass the couch he's lounging on, I remind myself of the fact that I'm leaving for 4 days for a writing retreat. Then I remember that I'm suppose to have writing done for the retreat, and I'm lugging laundry instead. Silent rage ensues further as I realize he's having a very tough time taking note of my full-on passive aggressive pistation at this point.
The kids are dancing around my cleaning. I'm trying to ignore their carefree weekend glee while I find a rotting apple core in a football helmet and dirty socks in a bathroom vanity drawer. The trash can is 2" from the violated drawer. What the hell?
I'm doing my best to suppress my ever growing rage and disgust. When I go to grab the hanging laundry in the laundry area. I swoop the hanging clothes over to one side and it the bar holding this weeks and last week's laundry comes crashing down. It's a very loud crash. And I might have wailed a loud frustrating primal sound in an effort to muffle any mommy expletives. You know, still maintaining that passive-aggressive rage and all. Anyways, it was loud. Had I heard it, I would have rushed down to make sure the laundry victim was okay. But no. No one came to my aid. No one even shouted from the couch, "You okay down there?" No one even waited for a commercial to come check on me. Nuthin.
It took me a while to clean up the crash. And as I started, Max came down, you know the kid who's closet I'd just cleaned and reorganized. The kid who's laundry is now officially cleaned in a record best - 2 days. And you know what that punk says to me? He looks straight at me and that colossal mess and with complete concern in his eyes, he says, "Mom, can I go to Bobby's house?"
"Eff you kid, get over here and help me."
Fine, I didn't say that.
I said in my best irritated you better get this tone as a message voice as I could, "SURE. GO. OVER. TO. BOBBY'S. THAT. WOULD. BE. GREAT. JUST. REAL. GREAT. KID!" Just like that.
He got my message loud and clear. So efficiently in fact, he turned and ran to safety at Bobby's.
I finished the laundry and as I walked out of my room, I noticed, the laundry basket was full. Of dirty clothes. Again. Catherine Zeta-Jones recently checked herself in a hospital for bi-polar disorder. Her husband just went through intensive chemo, his ex-wife is suing them, well there's the paparazzi and all, and she has two kids. She's a mom. So, while I watched Matt Lauer review the symptoms of bi-polar: particularly the cyclical extreme moods of highs and lows, I couldn't help but chuckle while I folded the next round of laundry and contemplated going on strike.
That's how I roll.
Song of the Day: The Bug by Mary Chapin Carpenter
Leave a comment