By Carol Kaufmann, Mama Tricks
The hubby and I gave each other the ultimate Christmas gift. (And no, it was not another potential baby.) As allergy-prone souls in a cooped-up winter of dust, molds, cat dander and two toddlers, we’d had all the stuffy noses we could take. No more.
We splurged big time; we bought a new vacuum cleaner.
The suction of our all-the-bells-and-whistles Dyson is so powerful, our neighbors report cleaner carpets. For those who haven’t seen the witty commercials, or experienced this engineering phenom, allow me to illuminate. As we glide the Dyson over our crumb-covered carpets, we can actually SEE the crumbs (or whatever) being sucked up into the body of the cleaner. So
gratifying is this vision, the hubby and I argue over whose turn it is to vacuum.
Because I spend way too much time in my house thinking about how to keep kid detritus at bay, I’ve learned why this vision fills me with such satisfaction. The machine neatly contains all the crap that is an inevitable part of parenthood—the dinner droppings, the bits of Play-doh, the pieces of plastic toys that seem to have no home, the dirt, the dirt and the dirt.
The ultimate organizer, the vacuum places all the unwanted pieces of life where they should go, away from a place where it causes trouble. (Or sneezing.) It doesn’t leave a spec of anything remotely unpalatable around to further annoy anyone.
While vacuuming this week, I found that I wanted to be more like my Dyson. I thought about all the times I’ve aired my dirt, my complaints about my too busy, stressed out existence all over the proverbial rug of (un)willing listeners. My rants usually served no higher purpose than stirring up my own cloud of dust. Perhaps I would have been better off emptying out my collection of irritants into the trash.
Aren’t we all a bit tired of the never-ending whine about our complicated, over-scheduled lives—especially our own? It’s the 21st century. Life. Just. Moves.
Drop obligations. Say no. Streamline. Leave the dishes unwashed. and (gasp!) the rugs unvacuumed. Schedule a massage. WHATEVER! Keep your head down and keep on.
Suck it up. Just like the Dyson.
Carol Kaufmann regularly shares her “Mama Tricks” with The Well Mom. Her work has appeared in Reader’s Digest,National Geographic, The Washington Post, and in the anthology, A Woman’s Europe. She lives in Alexandria, VA with her husband, two children and two obese rescue cats.
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