Suck It Up

 

Mom lives in a dusty desert, so when I found out that her vacuum cleaner was thirty years old, I told her that if she bought a new vacuum, I would clean every crevice and nook in her house from floor to ceiling.

Last week, Mom bought a Kansas Cyclone 3000, Black Hole Edition vacuum cleaner. As promised, I got out my super slider furniture movers and got to work. First up, her office because that's where I sleep when I visit.

Mom has an organization gene that she obviously didn't pass on to me. Her office is full of ephemera that she has collected over the decades during her visits to six continents. It is neatly stacked or filed under, on and around shelves and furniture. I moved armfuls of it from one side of the room, cleaned thoroughly, then began to put it back.

That is until I came up with the bright idea that since I wasn't putting it back as neatly as she would, and since she probably had a special way she wanted it, why not just ask her to put it back. That way, she would know where everything was. And the job would go faster.

What I didn't expect was that she would want to sort through and look at everything as she moved it from one pile to the next. Old family pictures, conference brochures, supplies from special events at the refuge, and scrapbooks from every adventure she went on. She transitioned quickly from housecleaning to memory lane.

I thought I could vacuum the entire house in a day, but now I see that isn't going to happen. I can only stay for two more days, and I see how it will be spent. The good news is: less time for cleaning up her yard!

Nancy Sherer

 

 


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