We’ve slipped into a post summer household rut. Still waiting to get our groove on with fall routines. Sun bleached beach towels are still swaying stiffly in the breeze “drying out” out back of the house. I should wash them. Pack them away, before they disintegrate. It’s a game of towel chicken though. Every day my daughters say they’ll get them. They’ll get them.
Maybe I like seeing them there a little. It means summers not officially over. See? Our beach towels are still hanging to dry!
In an attempt to corral the clutter I built a “Back to School Organization Station”. It would be awesome – if I could park in the garage, and our path into the house took us through the mudroom. I’m still waiting for my husband to install the racks I bought so we can hang the bikes. There’s a pile of boxes waiting to be broken down where my car should be parked. Bags for Goodwill. So the organization station is gathering dust. We come into the house through our courtyard and into the dining room, leaking a trail of papers from the dining room table and down the hall to the kitchen. The backpacks are on the couch.
There is a suspicious aroma of dead banana coming from the red one. Dead banana funk and it’s not even October. This is a bad sign.
So I wash the bag, along with another from last year that I found in the hall closet. Never got around to washing that this summer either. The laundry room has toys in it. Dress up clothes. Make up. A hairbrush from the girls.
So I defuzz the hairbrushes and put the make up away and cannot help but notice the capless tubes piled up on the counter, and in the drawers. A toothpaste graveyard. RIP benzoyl peroxide. Adieu cherry lipgloss. The ooze of sticky fluid cosmetics forms the perfect foundation for a fine particulate dusting of eyeshadow and powder makeup. This sticky fruity pink metallic glaze covers everything on the vanity. If we ever move the new owners of this house will have to replace the drawers. That is, unless they have teenaged girls of their own. In which case I’d advise leaving well enough alone.
Ten dollars, twenty, thirty. I use a CVS bag to toss used cotton balls and certainly spoilt compacts. Back from whence you come. So hard not to be angry. I remind myself to breathe. I look for the humor. A friend called me from her daughter’s bathroom in near tears the other day. Austerity measures were being taken. That girl isn’t getting so much as a chapstick without a medical note. This is the sort of thing I bring up when my daughter tells me I’m lucky she’s not one of the kids who steals, or smokes pot. She’s lucky she still has her lip gloss
I’m dying to work. Just shove in one more load of laundry. Can’t let myself get carried away here. I’m on a deadline.
But how can anyone possibly think clearly when there is a muddy sock, a knitting needle and a dry clean only chiffon shirt (borrowed without permission from me of course) shoved on a shelf with some rocks, a pen and a candy wrapper. How?
It is at this point I feel my sanity start to slip away for real. I can picture myself rocking. I stop and google “The Yellow Wallpaper” on my iPhone. Looking for solace in literature I lack the time to read. I read it as a teenager.
I don’t dare bring the toys back down to the playroom. I know what lurks in those bins. More socks. Lost game pieces. Flash cards. Marbles (possibly mine, lost), paperclips, hearing aid batteries, chewed gum, ball bearings, balls of cheese wax. To be honest I don’t know how half of it got into the house, let alone into the toy bins.
It’s enough to make me hyperventilate. Is this normal? Are other people’s kids such pigs? My mother laughs at me. Oh me! Of the famous underbed clutter zone. Of the junk and mess that made her cry. My kids are worse, I argue. And there are more of them. And my husband doesn’t see it. He just doesn’t see it. I’m all alone in here.
But there is hope.
It happens as I slam doors and drawers in the guest bathroom, sighing deeply as I forage for towels. The WRONG towels are hanging in there. Again. We have two sets of towels for the guest bath. The same two sets. We’ve had them for five years. But every week I dig them out of the kitchen rags, play hide and seek to find them amongst the beach towels or unearth them in the cabinets in the master bath where some helpful sort has located them – hanging a dishrag or beach towel in the guest bath instead.
“I HATE when people put the wrong towels in here Mommy,” says my 4 year old. Unprompted.
I recall him admonishing his sister recently for not putting away his Zoo Safari game properly, all pieces arranged just so and matching storage bag utilized. Hope sparks.
“I really like it when stuff is put away in the right place,” he continues. “It’s so annoying when people don’t put stuff away where it belongs and you can’t find it.”
OH MY G-D. My sanity has been saved. Saved by my OCD 4 year old son. Bless him.
That’s hilarious! My kids made me feel so disorganized sometimes as well, I guess we’re doing a good job raising them!
But at least the kids eventually grow up and move out. You should see the piles my husband leaves all over the place. And he’s allergic to wiping off counters.