The One With the Imelda Marcos Gene

I wasn’t even throwing the stuff away. It was going to Goodwill. Deseret Industries. The thrift store… whatever. Blessing the less fortunate (although what they are going to do with some really short tuxedo pants, three Ralph’s uniforms and a really skinny boy scout uniform, I don’t know. But I don’t care.) While I hate straightening and organizing with a white-hot passion, sometimes it has to be done.

I am actually fine with sorting and tossing. But that is because I was not born with that gene. You know the one. It causes one to feel mild discomfort throwing away anything made of paper. If the item is made of something slightly more substantial, such as cardboard, rotting food or photo paper, the discomfort is greatly intensified. Throwing away anything made of cloth, glass, leather or wood is physically impossible. It is like trying to escape earth’s gravity. Jump as high as you can… you are still going to come crashing down. Remember Imelda Marcos? When she and Ferdinand were exiled from the Phillipines in 1986, she was said to have left behind 15 mink coats, 508 gowns, 888 handbags and 1060 pairs of shoes. Okay, so she had an underlying problem. Newsweek recently cited her as being one of the “Most Greedy People of All Time.” But face it, the woman could not throw anything away (and is it me? or does it look like she forgot to remove the cardboard inserts from her sleeves?)

I figured out Skippy got the gene. He inherited it from DK. I learned a long time ago that if I am going to throw anything away, I have to wait until DK goes out of town. Or slip it into the trash right before the trash collector comes around. I have found him pulling stuff out that I have thrown away on numerous occasions. Just last week I tried to throw away an archaic piece of computer equipment. I thought it was gone. Nope. I just tripped over in the side yard this morning. He is sly, that one. This morning in the course of doing laundry, I took a good look at what passes for his “casual wardrobe.” It is not good. Honey, the 80’s called. They said they don’t even want any of that stuff back. You know how when you see some guy in line at the grocery store with a scruffy beard and long hair wearing work boots and a beer belly hanging over really short cutoffs, and you set your groceries down next to his egg salad and tallboy Budweiser and think, “Oh, that poor guy. Not married. If he had a wife, she would never let him leave the house in that.” Yeah. It’s like that. I think it’s time for some new jeans, DK. I have thrown away the old ones, and I defy you to find them.

So Saturday I kicked two white trash bags down the stairs. They were full of outgrown clothing. Like I said from the beginning, they were not going to the trash, but to the thrift store. Skippy spotted them, and began running his hands over the outside of the bags. I gave one another good kick toward the door. And then I noticed that Skippy was fighting back tears. Surprised, I asked him, “What’s the matter, bud? Are we giving away something you really wanted to keep?” I’m not a monster, for goodness’ sake. It is not like I was trying to give away his favorite blankie or something. “Uh-huh,” he nodded. “Well, what is it, Skip?” At this point, he burst into tears and buried his head in my leg. “I don’t know!” he sobbed. “I can’t see what’s in there!”

So I live with collectors. What do you collect? Here is my missionary board, with all the missionaries I have collected over the past few years...

P.S. As with all my photos, click to enlarge!
(Unless the photo is of my FACE)

The One With the House Elves

So, if you will remember, Saturday I was catering. I cooked in a big hurry, ran off to dip strawberries, and then back for just long enough to get ready to go to the catering job. I left my kitchen in a huge mess… garlic, bits of parsley everywhere, dirty skillets, dishes… and just hoped that the house elves would have it magically clean before I got home. I knew the odds were against that, since my family was going to a Memorial Day barbecue in my absence. I dragged through the door a little after 10:30 Saturday night, and found the kitchen just as I had left it. Actually… it was worse. I was so tired, though, I couldn’t stay up to clean it. I took some aspirin and went to bed.

At 8:00 Sunday morning I woke up and remem- bered I had the nasty kitchen waiting for me, so I combed my hair, found some shoes and headed, bleary-eyed, down the stairs. Walked into the kitchen just in time to find Elder Felkner wiping the last counter and Elder Murray starting the dishwasher he had just filled. They cleaned my kitchen while I slept! Elder Murray always says his dream is to do something that earns him a place in my blog (the guy is a dreamer, you know... being a famous singer, having a pirate-themed wedding cake... ah, yes... he and Elder Felkner both think big). I am afraid he was hoping for some outrageous prank or dangerous heroic feat to win him blog glory, but he will have to take what he gets, because as of today, they are both officially blog heroes. Of course, they don’t actually get to read the blog... heh heh... but it’s the thought that counts, right?

We don’t get to have the mission- aries for much longer. Cambria is twelve, and the bishops of both the congreg-ations that share our missionaries are looking for a new host family. *sniff* As the search is underway, I find myself surprised, and not for the first time, by how difficult it is to find them a home. Even in such an affluent area as ours, people are very reluctant to leave their comfort zone to make a place for them. We are not the typical host family. The ideal would be a retired couple, not a family with a houseful of kids. I am pretty sure that heaven and earth moved to bend the requirements a little so that we could have them for most of the last four years.

Despite the require-ments, there are plenty of people here in our area who qualify to host the mission- aries, but they all seem to have various reasons why they don’t feel comfortable doing it. One of the main ones is a loss of privacy. And okay...having two people live in your home who are not members of your family is undeniably less private. But do you know what I have decided? Privacy is highly overrated. Or maybe that isn’t even the right way to think about it. I don’t feel that our home life is less private… just that we have increased our family circle to include some amazing young men. And not only have they never breached the family’s privacy, but I have heard about how they have flatly refused to enter into gossip about our family, and have even defended family members on occasion, just as you would hope brothers would do. Elder Felkner and Elder Murray are the just the last in a long line of missionaries who have loved and served our family in countless ways.

I could make this a monster post, telling you all the ways that having the missionaries has been a blessing for my family. It would still not reflect how much I love, love, love them. There isn’t a downside, except maybe that eventually they all move on. But every missionary who has passed through our home has become a lifelong friend and beloved family member. And you tell me… who cannot use more of those?

P.S. You might notice that, left to their own devices, missionaries tend to take a lot of pictures of themselves driving. Why? I don’t know. It is one of the great mysteries.

The One With All the Entropy (My 100th Post!)

I have been studying this concept of entropy. I am going to apologize in advance for my simplistic approach to the subject. If you have a scientific brain, you might want to just stop reading right now. Entropy is a central concept in thermodynamics. As such, it is the measure of disorder in a closed, but changing system. But as a sort of basic principle, entropy might be described as the process by which everything naturally unmakes itself. It is how, left to the natural order of things, household… personal appearance… financial stability…all will eventually devolve into chaos and disrepair. Do you see how fundamental entropy is? It is why you can’t have your house all clean at one time. It is why you can’t leave five-year-olds without a babysitter. It all starts to fall apart.

Some of my very favorite books are the Alvin Maker series by Orson Scott Card. The basic premise is that the Unmaker is constantly at work trying to tear down and cause darkness and destruction until, in true Good vs. Evil form, Alvin is born…the seventh son of a seventh son…with the power to Make. To create. To fight the evil Unmaker. Yes, the books ooze symbolism. And as with all my favorite books, I love the characters like they are my own best friends. But it is this concept of making versus unmaking that really appeals to me. I realize that my entire world is subject to entropy, and it is my job to fight it. Make. Create. Clean. Repent. Repair. Learn. Forgive. Serve others. All these things fight entropy.

On that subject, Tyler is coming home for five days! He is my household version of Alvin. He is Handy. I love handy men. Is it wrong that I have a whole list of things that Tyler is going to help me do while he is home? Come on…we’re just fighting entropy, here. What about you? Are you a positive force, or are you sitting back and letting entropy have its way? If it is the latter, you should at least drag your feet a little on the way down... And on that note, I am going to go fight in my kitchen for a little while.

The One Where She Really Stayed on Top of It

Well, compar- atively speaking. Sometimes it is okay to compare yourself to others. It is a little shot in the arm to realize that if this was a race, you would not be in dead last. It is why I watch “The Real Housewives of Orange County.” It makes me feel like a really good parent, because at least I don’t serve my kids alcohol or any of the other over-the-top bad-parent things those women do.

This has been a typical week. Yesterday I went on an adventure. I picked up my friend and her five-month-old baby, and we set out, armed with a diaper bag, pacifier, high heels and a couple of Yoplait Lights…traversing fifty miles, four different freeways, and several miles of surface streets without a single sign written in English, to arrive before 8:00 a.m. at a courthouse in Los Angeles County. My friend is having custody issues, which was the reason for our visit. I will only say that the hearing went miraculously and quite entirely in her favor, which can only be the result of the fasting and prayers of many people on her behalf. My little five-month-old friend and I stayed outside the courtroom during the hearing, and the two of us learned a lot during our pacing the hallway outside the chambers, especially that a courthouse is a pretty bad way to have to divvy up child care, and should be avoided when at all possible.

Besides the courthouse run, I have spent time working on music this week, and have made some really good progress. I have fed dinner to people other than my own family three times, and I have swept my backyard. I threw a going-away party for Glass, I pulled a couple of weeds (cut me some slack here…I’m no Farmer McGregor) and did a few loads of laundry (well…two loads…and DK did one of those).

And okay, no… my house is not really any tidier than usual. And no, I haven’t suddenly started cleaning out my junk drawers or keeping a calendar…and no, I’m still not wearing a watch. But as home organization goes, I am not in dead last place here… check out what my neighbor left out on Tuesday for the trash man. Ho ho ho…Merry Christmas!

The One With the Little Science Lesson

I used to have a housekeeper. My house was cleaner then. You're thinking, "Well, yeah... duh." But it's not what you think (unless you have had a housekeeper... then it is probably exactly what you are thinking). When I had a housekeeper, I used to spend hours every week cleaning so the house would be clean before the housekeeper came. It cost me about $100 every week for that. At some point I decided to pretend that the housekeeper was coming, and save myself that $100 every week. It didn't work. Not even for a week. In fact, I was so happy not to stress out over the housekeeper anymore that I would have paid $100 a week for them just to not come. Plus there was that time the housekeeper accidentally drank bleach at my house... that was pretty traumatic, I'm not gonna lie.

But now it has been three or four years since I had the housekeeper to make me clean (clean, the verb, not clean, the adjective). I'm looking around right now, and it is not good. I thought about taking a few pictures so you could see what I am talking about. But there are those among you who would still not be able to identify with my problem. In fact, you're thinking right now, "In the time it took you to write this post, you could have cleaned your whole downstairs. Scrubbed three toilets. Put away your Christmas decorations. Man, you just don't get it, do you?

It is not my fault. The laws of physics are against me:

1. Newton's First Law of Motion states that in order for the motion of an object to change, a force must act upon it, a concept generally called inertia. There are no such forces at work in my home, therefore all of the objects that are cluttering my house are doomed to stay where they are.

2. Newton's Second Law of Motion, translated from Latin, states: The acceleration produced by a particular force acting on a body is directly proportional to the magnitude of the force and inversely proportional to the mass of the body. There was this one time when Ethan and Dillon were racing toward each other after school so that they could walk home. They both came around the same corner at the same time, and the resulting collision sent them both to the health office. Ethan was nursing a head injury...although that was the year where I had to go to the health office six different times to sign that head injury form for Ethan, so I wasn't terribly worried about him...and the janitor was still mopping up the blood from Dillon's nose, which was clearly broken. But...I digress...Newton's Second Law of Motion has no application to my housework, because there is no force, and definitely no acceleration at work here.

3. Newton's Third Law of Motion: To every action there is always opposed an equal reaction; or, the mutual actions of two bodies upon each other are always equal, and directed to contrary parts. This one is probably my worst enemy. For every single object I pick up, there is not one, but several other people leaving/dropping/drooling/slopping/dumping/throwing objects much faster than I can possibly pick up. I am in this alone.

4. The Law of Gravity. This one is working against me as well. I have come to realize that the problem is too much horizontal space. When I put up the lid on my piano so that it is at a steep diagonal, then no one can leave their stuff there. What I need is for every surface in my house to be at a slant...preferably all slanting toward one big central vacuum system/floor drain, with an industrial-size hose that I can use to just hose everything down periodically. Then gravity would be working in my favor. You may have noticed that my blog is really neat and tidy. Peaceful. Almost soothing, right? Proves my point. It's always vertical... or at least at a pretty steep slant.

Listen. I could get into the Theory of Relativity, or Quantum Physics. It wouldn't matter. I will tell you right now, that none of them want me to have a clean house. Right now, I think I'm going to go bake something (physics loves me in the kitchen) and then lie down for awhile. The gravity is really starting to wear on me...