A SNOWSTORM OF GUILT

I awoke today to hear there is going to be another 8-10' of snow in, as Al Roker likes to say, my neck of the woods. Ugh. We still have dirty snow. You know, patches of snow and slush and mud. Not pretty. So the very best I can ask for is that this new snowfall is going to at least leave us with a pretty white carpet.


Now you may be looking at the above picture and thinking, "Oh. This is how Blondie stocks up for a snowstorm...a lot of Rice A Roni, dog snacks and taco chips." Wrong. This is a small example of what I wake up to every morning. Granted., I pushed everything back and as close together as possible to look neater, and wiped the counter tops off (I don't want to air too much dirty laundry at once, for Pete's sake, and who is Pete?). I just want to ask you, are you the type that cleans up before you go to bed or do you just leave it all until the morning? It seems that even if I do a white glove number in my kitchen after dinner and I am the last one to go to bed, a mysterious little Messy Fairy comes in during the night and I wake up to a disaster. When I get up in the morning I like to have a couple of cups of coffee and catch up on some blogs. And having a counter full of stuff and a sink full of dishes (okay, sometimes they haven't even made it to the sink) waiting for me can really take the joy out of the morning.
Tomorrow will be one week since The Husband came home from his golf trip. These are his clubs, still in their flight bag. And no, this isn't really bad, having them there in front of the stove, because before this they were in the middle of the living room. You can see that they are also in front of a door. This door goes down to the basement and I think that is where the clubs are slowly heading. By spring they will be tucked away in a nice corner down there (if they take one step at a time, literally).


A long time ago after I had first gotten married, my mother learned that I was ironing The Husband's undershirts. I did this because we were short on space and they wouldn't all fit in his drawers unless I did this. She said to me, "Jane, if you start doing this sort of thing now, you will be doing it forever." I wasn't really sure what she was getting at, but I do now. Even if I skip or don't get around to the everyday morning clean up, jaws drop. I am like clockwork. A robot. Mom ALWAYS gets everything done. The advice I have always gotten is "Just don't do it." Sort of the opposite of the Nike ad. But one thing holds me back: If I don't do it, who will??


I hear a lot of bloggers talking about the time constraints they are under when it comes to blogging. It seems they want to a lot more than time allows and I sense an underlying guilt. I know I can feel this way. I juggle my housework, errands and cooking with blogging and I try to throw in some time for reading or crafting or just watching a movie. And I think I have a nice balance going here. The problem is, nobody else thinks so. I wonder if The Husband ever sits in his chair reading the paper or playing online poker, wondering, "Gee, I wonder if Jane is irritated at me. Should I be making her a snack?" Or Abby, lying on the family room couch watching another reality show about unwed pregnant teen couples, dirty dishes, headbands, bobby pins, magazine and nail polish remover all within fingertip reach, thinking, "Wow. I really feel bad about all of this. I should offer to make dinner tonight." Oh, my gosh. Knock me over with a feather. And I am supposed to feel guilty? Guilty???


About a year and a half ago I was in the hospital for a yucky surgery. I had one complication after another and ended up in there for a little over two weeks. As time went on The Husband and kids were getting a bit more demanding with the doctors on when I would be going home. The doctor's excuse, that I had pneumonia, wasn't satisfying them. One day in a pain medication induced dream, I too, was begging to go home. I was begging to go home because I had to clean. I woke up in a sweat and thought about the dream. I knew it was going to be a long road before I could actually get up and clean. And then it hit me. THEY didn't know that. THEY wanted me to come home and CLEAN! And cook. And do the laundry. Oh, it was enough to ask for more morphine.
On a lighter note, I finished this book, which I told you about last week...
...and moved on to this book, which I am halfway through and loving! As another blogger commented, it is a little more raw than the movie, but it is just the way the author is. I'm not crazy about profanity in a book unless it makes a point, and it does. And it is hilarious. I can't wait to see all of the movie when I am finished. I fell asleep before the end the time I rented it.
This is my personal bookshelf in my bedroom. I can honestly say I have only read about 3 or 4 of these books. I thought I had lost my love of reading. But I have found it. I am on a roll.
And this is my next book, which I received from my husband for Christmas (Do you read the 'Alphabet Books'?). I am assuming he wanted me to read and so I am going to do it...without guilt.