The problem with recovering from surgery is that inertia settles in. The things you had to overlook because you couldn’t do anything about them have piled up, and now that you can do something about them, you long for the days of housecoats and slippers. My God the laundry pile is massive. I could make a wig out of the hair on the upstairs bathroom floor. And I must face this mess and tackle it. Why? Because it refuses to go away, no matter how much I ignore it.
Yesterday I wanted to run away from housework, take a long drive in the country, but Bob decided he needed to be an ant rather than a grasshopper and get his chores done. Which meant I should, too. Because I don’t have an excuse anymore — I feel great. I keep hoping that the mood to clean will strike me and make it all easier to face, but that mood never comes. I never ever feel like cleaning. Never. I just have to force myself to do it. And man does it put me in a foul mood. Yesterday I was on my hands and knees cleaning the upstairs bathroom floor and hating everything I could think of to hate. Housework makes me bitchy. And I can’t even blame PMS anymore.
But today I discovered something that makes it easier to cope with, and no, it’s not a pill. I got a splashy phone with an MP3 player included, so now I can put my phone in my pocket, stuff the tiny little ear plugs inside my ears, and make the world go away. It’s hard to hear, “Mama, can you get me some chocolate milk?” when you’re listening to Voodoo Chile. Until the voodoo child starts crying because nobody will answer her. But listening to my own private tunes makes me less inclined to hate the clothes or resent the dishes and the people who dirtied them.
Here’s my hope for the next cool gadget: Virtual reality glasses that make your house look clean when it’s actually filthy. You can wear them all the time and pass out extra pairs to your guests when they step through the door. Of course, there’s always the matter of “What’s that smell?” but they’ve already invented a solution for that: Febreeze.