I actually enjoy the fatigue that comes from a good-ol‘-stem-to-stern housecleaning. These days, however, the house is lucky to get the dust buster poked in a few corners, let alone a good Swiffering. One neighbor of mine described her house as “neat, but dirty”. I think we officially joined that club when I was tempted to throw some Listerine in the towel bowl just to make sure I got all germs with the next flush.

Truly, I don’t have enough hands, hours, or motivation to hit all the baseboards, quarter-rounds, window panes, cracks and crevices that need attention. Which, would be all of them, in case you’re wondering. Of course, when Mo practiced her cursive writing in the dust coating her bookcase, I knew I had to do something.

The problem with housecleaning is that, like with so many other household tasks, they seem to multiply exponentially in a matter of moments. For instance, I may see a fingerprint (or five) on the window pane, so I go to get some Windex. En route through the kitchen for my supplies, I step through a minefield of shredded crayon wrappers, Cheerios, broken hair elastics, and assorted Barbie shoes. I make a notation to get the broom and the dust buster. In the kitchen, the sink looks like it threw up since no one ran the garbage disposal before turning on the dishwasher. I Clorox the sink, run some water and add some baking soda down the disposal. Then, just for kicks and because no one else is home, I dump the rest of the baking soda down the disposal, add a few drops of red food coloring and some vinegar. “Molten lava” erupts from the garbage disposal. I’m such a child, but the glee is short lived because now, I have to clean that up, too.

Kitchen sink finally de–gunked, I notice some flower petals that have jettisoned themselves off of the plant on the window sill. This has now formed a nice little party with crumbs from the toaster and assorted condensation rings from where we’ve left glasses and mugs. I wipe down the counter and then turn around to hit the other counters. Then I see the stovetop. I wipe that down, and notice fingerprints on the cabinet doors surrounding the stove. Fingerprints! I was supposed to get the Windex for the fingerprints in the other room. And I resume my course for the cleaning supplies in the laundry room.

I open the laundry room door and clearly see that the washer and dryer have caught the same bug as the sink — there is clothing vomitus everywhere. I drag the laundry buckets out into the living room and being rolling socks, folding underwear and undershirts, and sorting 2T pants from 4T pants. When I reach to the bottom of the bucket for the last piece, my eye catches a rogue raisin on the carpet next to the bucket. Just ahead of the raisin is another broken elastic hair tie and peanut. Time to get the vacuum.

Now, I have a strong aversion to vacuuming. I mean, I would rather write a thesis on William Faulkner than vacuum. Growing up, I would do just about anything to get out of vacuuming. Ugh, it was the bane of my pubescent existence! My dad was a regular Vacuum Gestapo, what with his reviewing my work to see that vacuum tracks were clear and present throughout all carpeted areas of the house. You know, vacuum tracks — the lines in the carpet that shows that it’s been freshly vacuumed? Yeah, you gotta have the tracks.

We had this Sears vacuum that was like a bloated footstool attached to a giraffe neck length of hose topped off by a phonebook sized head that sucked up all the detritus of daily life. And it had a retractable electrical cord, so when you were done, you could press a lever and the cord would get snapped back up into the main unit. Snapped is a key word — I gave myself all kind of lashings just trying to wrap up the vacuum and put it away. And don’t get me started on dragging the darn thing through several rooms and around corners! I would tug and tug on the hose and finally, the main unit would come hurtling from another room and crash into my ankles. From the calf down, my legs were varying shades of yellowish-green black and blue marks cross hatched with electric cord lacerations. I swore I when I grew up, I’d never vacuum again.

When we got married, I think one of DH’s vows was “to love, honor and vacuum,” as he has been the sole master of our Dirt Devil. The other day, however, the rugs were looking like the entire sandbox from the pre-school has been liberally sprinkled over its dimensions. DH was outside sweeping up leaves and branches, so I thought I would surprise him by vacuuming the rugs. Such a sweet wifely thing to do, right? So I go get the vacuum, unwind the (non-retractable) cord, plug it in, step on the switch and. . .nothing.

Hmmm. We have electricity. I’ve got this thing properly plugged into the wall. I’m stepping on the lever. The handle release is working and yet, nothing. It can’t be broken; we (DH) just used it last week-end. I empty the filter, I examine the hose attachments. It’s not working. I don’t know what else to do and I don’t want to ask DH to come look at it, but I’ve already spent about 10 minutes fooling with this thing and . . .wait a minute. . . .What’s this lever right here?

Oh yes, that would be the “on” switch. When I’m done, I’m going to use my college degree to get the fingerprints off of the windowpanes.