Getting Stuff Done

I am taking advantage of one of the ways I get my house clean -- invite company!

Actually a young man we have known since birth had his mom call me last week and ask if it was ok if he came to visit. So I didn't plan to clean. But he loves the beaches here, his family rented a cottage near our rental a couple summers, and it's hard for me to say no to company.

I think my son may be disgusted with me. The house has been a disaster area since he returned home for the summer. In order to get my shop open I had to move things out and the house was the cheapest option. But that made the house cluttered. Plus the boxes of Christmas decorations had not been put back into the attic. Most of them were in the guest room.

Now that company is coming, I'm cleaning. My son kindly took those big plastic tubs up into the attic. And this company is a young man who used to bug my son with his hyperactivity when they were kids! Hardly seems fair to my son, I'm sure!
(completely unrelated, click here to see what my son is going to do for the final camp banquet, where he's cooking this summer).

The other way to get my house clean is to get up at 6:30 am and start working. What a novel concept! I would rather stay in bed reading the novel until 10, wander downstairs, check my email, putter about for a while, go out to lunch at 11 or so, come home and putter about for another couple of hours, play spider solitaire til I win or give up, plop myself down on the couch to eat dinner and watch tv in the evening, then back to bed, the novel, and sleep. You can see why that model does not get the house clean, neat, or anything close!

Dang! I start a business that means I now have to be somewhere most days. Then I discover to get the house clean I actually have to get up early and work! Whatever happened to a life of leisure, soap operas and bon-bons? Not that I ever really liked soap operas or bon-bons, but still!

I love Laggin's pictures of houses!
Here is my attempt to find a tiny dancer-related pic!

Work boots for a cleaning dancer.
Hope you all have a productive day.

*Masters of Mothering Arts -- cuz it sure ain't a science!

There's a lot they don't teach you at mothering school. I'm pretty sure no one gets a Master's Degree, but it would be nice.

Think of it -- Graduate level courses, a practicum, internships, a required thesis paper on something you actually know in your bones; recognition you have done a good job; a set of letters that signify you have gone beyond the basics of feeding and clothing them; acknowedgment they have become exceptional people because of your great work, not in spite of it! Your Name, MMA.* Maybe even deference and the best table at hip restaurants.

Nancy Friday states in My Mother, My Self that children survive if they get good enough mothering. This was helpful to me. I figured I could be "good enough."

But I actually viewed myself as a really good, exceptional mother. You know, one of the best. I said that to my daughter while we were traveling last January. Her face . . . then her laugh . . . then her exclamation that I was joking wasn't I, made me revise my view of my mothering skills.

Interestingly enough, my feelings weren't hurt. I was just sorry that what I had taken for great mothering was not seen the same from her side of the (sometimes closed) door. I wanted her to have experienced me as an exceptional mom -- not for the accolades or great tables at fancy restaurants -- because I love her so much and wanted to give her my best.

But mothering is a dance. I love to waltz, my daughter is a tap dancer. My mom is a tap dancer, I never learned the steps. I know what would qualify as great mothering if it was directed toward me. If asked, I bet my daughter could say the same. (Actually when she was 13 she told me the kind of mother she would be. It didn't look a lot like me). What is considered wonderful by one daughter, is considered laughable by another!

This post started as a comment on my son leaving home. Obviously I got a bit off track. Tomorrow I will start my post the same way, "There's a lot they don't teach you at mothering school."