My husband has been gone for a week.  I don’t mind really.  I mean I miss his existence in the house, but I can certainly survive alone.  I have.  I was a single mom for quite a while.  Once while I was married, and once while I was not.  The problem is this: when I am alone I get bored.  When I get bored I clean.  I hate cleaning.

My mother-in-law, Tootsie, loved a clean, well organized house more than almost anything.  The first time I spent the night at her home (my hubby and I were just dating at the time) I realized the extent of her obsession with cleanliness when my post shower routine was interrupted with a knock at the door.  Suspecting a house fire, I opened the door to find Tootsie with a bottle of Pine-Sol and a rag. “Can I come in?”  Stunned beyond belief, I of course said yes, and she cleaned the shower while I watched shivering in a towel.  I do not share my mother-in-law’s love for clean or cleaning.  I enjoy having a clean house.  I do not enjoy getting it there. 

I want a housekeeper.  I cannot afford a housekeeper.  What I really want is a maid that will work from about noon till about eight at night, but if I can’t afford a housekeeper who could come in weekly, you can bet your butt the maid thing is probably not going to work out.  Life is not fair.   I ask for so little.  I am vexed by so much.  The last housekeeper I had was a jewel.  She could clean sin off your soul, and I mean that literally.  Every time she came in she wanted to pray over me.  She could clean like a m’er f’er, but she preached the entire time she was here (and yes I recognize the irony of saying she could clean like an m’er f’er).  I could ignore the preaching.  I was, after all, raised Baptist.  So as long as she cleaned well she could preach till the sheep came home (get it…Jesus was a shepherd?)  Anyway, she stayed with us for awhile and then she got into it with some of the ladies in the neighborhood and just dumped the lot of us.  She said it wouldn’t be fair to clean for some and not all.  I say Bullshit!  She was mad at them not me.  Doesn’t matter now though…I couldn’t afford to pay her anyway.  My dad used to have a saying “I’m so poor I can’t afford to pay attention.”  I’m there. 

Anyway right now, to quote the small ghost buster in Poltergeist “This house is clean!” Someone asked me once if my OCD included housekeeping.  I responded by saying that you could eat off of my floors.  The only problem was, I wouldn’t have to cook.  My house is clean enough for company and dirty enough for family.  Don’t you hate it when you go into a home that feels like a museum.  Everything is so perfect you are afraid to touch anything.  Your hostess asks if you would like a drink, and you truly would love something but you are so afraid you will make a mess that you don’t dare imbibe.  You suffer the whole time you are there and duck out to the nearest Sonic ASAP for a limeade.  That is not my home.  Put your feet up, set your drink down, and when it’s time….get your butt out!!  That’s my house.  Just the way I like it.  It is also kid friendly.  It kinda has to be. 

Anyway, there are only a few more rooms that need to be re-vamped.  I’ve cleaned out all the cabinets, re-organized all the drawers, vacuumed, dusted, mopped (somewhere Tootsie is soooo happy) all of the downstairs and most of the upstairs.  I think it’s something like four more days before he’s home and I’ve got maybe three more rooms and two of them are small.  I need to pace myself.  If I run out of rooms all that is left is closets…the only thing worse than cleaning is cleaning closets.  I need a hobby!

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