I dreamt my whole house was clean...

Ay me! What an idyllic sight it was, too! No dust, no pet hair, no stray bits of thread, no bits of foodstuffs left on the counter, gleaming floors, fresh-smelling linens, nothing in the laundry baskets... S I G H . . . .

Well, it's something to shoot for, as opposed to shooting myself about!

My Pal lent me a book called Getting Things Done. Today I have followed its precepts, and already, at 11:43 am, I've done and accomplished more than I have been doing in entire days, lately! So something works.

I'm about to do something to the sewing room - not quite sure what, but I have to define that goal right after finishing this blog. If I don't define what it is I want to accomplish (besides the whole house being in perfect order - unattainable) then I won't know when I'm done! But already I have a sense of peace, sitting here, knowing that I'm going to accomplish something today. As opposed to my usual frame of mind - a vague sense of panic that swirls around me no matter where I'm looking because it's all too much!

I've worked out recently that the utter chaos in my home is a big reason people seldom come to see me. And since I love visitors, I'm going to fix that, somehow. Because I want my friends to feel comfortable when they're here.

As I walked the dog and cat this morning, I passed a neighbour who was rinsing out her garbage bins. "Yuck," she said to me. "We'd been away a few weeks, and the...DEATH! inside these things!"

I laughed and said, "to me, it's not so much the dead stuff as the living things, like the maggots!"

She replied, "Well, that's what I meant, but I didn't want to talk about them. I guess I'm obsessive" she finished with a laugh.

"Oh, I don't think so at all!" I replied. "I firmly believe garbage buckets should be washed and rinsed each and every time there's a spill!" She nodded, then I added, "...not that I actually DO that, I just BELIEVE in it!"

We both laughed.

And then I realized it - I BELIEVE.

I BELIEVE my house should be CLEAN. Free of dust, pet hair, stains, junk, mess.... It should be pristine! That's the house I BELIEVE in!

And I believe that when I die, I'm going to go to a better place: a mansion, just for me.

And it'll be sparkling! From basement to attic, my home will be clean, fresh, airy and bright!

Something to hope for!

The Way We Was

Mild food poisoning.

That's what I came home from our camping trip with, it turns out. I thought I was dying, I thought I had a kidney stone, but no, it was a simple case of mild food poisoning.

Food poisoning is considered a mild case, BTW, when it doesn't kill you. It only FEELS like it's gonna kill you, but a day or two later - Surprise! - you're still alive, ready to suffer through some more of this thing they call "life".

As I rise from my sickbed and survey what awaits me in "life" today, I see every room in the house stuffed with sandy remnants of our camping trip. Hubby was WONDERFUL. He got the car unpacked, got the cooler contents into the fridge, and got me tylenol, cranberry juice, pillows and the heating pad. All before heading off for work.

Day 1 at home: I lay on the couch and alternately slept and groaned. Teetered off into town for physiotherapy, where the therapist, a cutie-pie several decades younger than me, told me off for not having gone to see the doctor. I did manage to quietly point out to her that when one suffers from fibromyalgia, as do I, that one does not run to see the doctor at every new pain, because we basically are in pain every day. The doctors just look at you like you're nuts and say come back in a week if it's still bad.

Day2 at home. I'm in less pain, on the couch with coffee and heating pad, screwing up my moral courage to the point where I can empty and deal with the contents of one bag. Then it's off to two medical appointments this afternoon.

I'm using this quiet time to reflect on this past week's camping experience.

I see sunny skies and huge campfires. People who all like each other singing and joking around the campfire. Teasing each other. Floating on the lake for hours. Getting stung by two wasps while picking up firewood. Eating a whole container of Ben 'n' Jerry's ice cream. Drinking - and I don't mean water! Trying to play Taboo! with a pal who insisted on playing for both teams, helping his opponents and throwing his teammates off the scent with his sarcastic comments while we were trying to guess the words. Beautiful Daughter, after being teased by Handsome Boyfriend about not wanting to walk through muck, pointing to herself and saying "Hello - Girl!?" Helping Beautiful Daughter prepare for an audition by reading the script out loud to her in many different accents: Southern States, Paki, J.A.P.....

Watching the two Teenage Girls paddle the canoe off into the lake. Seeing a crane fly into the lily pads. Teensy downy-headed ducklings, whiffling softly to their mother. Sleeping ducks, with heads turned backwards and tucked deep into their feathers. Loons. Lilies opening to the sun. Lilies closing at dusk. A catfish swimming around my feet. The flip-flop fiasco: Friend M attempting to walk to our site from hers, getting both flip-flops sucked off her feet by the deep sand, and only one popping up. The search for the missing flip-flop that must have buried it forever. Her husband wading into the water after she asked him to help her find it, saying "Darling, show me this lake...."

The thunderstorm, one boom rolling over top of another with no break, sometimes five or six rolling over each other, a constant roaring for an hour before the rain came...

Watching Beautiful Daughter and Handsome Boyfriend take stones and axes to the ground around the tents, trying to dig a canal so they wouldn't float away overnight...

Handsome Boyfriend spending three hours chopping wood and kindling for his big bonfire, setting it up carefully. The rain coming just before he was ready to strike the match. All of us running out to cover it with tinfoil and hold a big umbrella over it so all his hard work wouldn't be wasted. His surprise that we all cared. Him jumping over the fire - twice - and the flames were at least four feet high.

Watching Hubby paddle quietly away by himself in the canoe at dusk - something he's waited four years to do.

Getting stuck covered in soap in the shower because I'd been camping for so many years there that I didn't read the sign telling me it now gave water only in increments of 50¢, instead of single quarters. The cleaning staff lady giving up on my wailing and going to get me a second quarter so I could rinse off. Me, frustrated at the situation and myself, cussing under my breath and complaining "and they WONDER why I hate coming to shower here!"

The bullfrog that lived under the roots of a tree on our lot. The little "rubber-band" frogs out in the lilies - they really do sound like the twang of a rubber band, proof positive, I used to say, that god has a sense of humor.

The Dog, swimming to get a stick. Swimming to get a frisbee. Swimming to get a water bottle. Swimming, looking slightly lost, just for the sake of swimming. Looking lost, because it had never occurred to her that she could swim without having to retrieve something! Rolling in the sand after a good shake, lying and baking herself in the sun, as tired and happy as a dog could be. Ready to go to bed at eight pm, frustrated with all of us sitting for hours around the fire. Following me to the bathroom, right into my stall, because no one had noticed she was off her leash. Jumping for joy when she saw Stepdaughter and Daughter and Friends. Jumping for joy, for no particular reason. Sleeping for two full days after coming home. "Dead dog," is our description.

But alas, my trip was also full of pain. This campground never dries out, and fibromyalgia really gets going in a nice, damp environment. New pain in the lower back, so bad I couldn't straighten up, couldn't lift myself, much less a finger, to help with anything.

Being filled with despair at the total chaos in our campsite, wishing I had come with the Friends instead of myself, since THEY were neat and organized!

Nobody wanted to believe me, but my camping days are over. I simply can't bend down any more, to pick things up, to set up the fire or stoke it, to enter or leave the tent. I may not be that old, but I'm that broken. My knees, my back, my legs - they're living on social security at this point.

It are a fact: I've done my tenting time. I need to move on now, to renting a cottage or something where I don't have to bend double to go through a door. Something where being disorganized doesn't spell disaster. Something that comes with air conditioning, a firm mattress, and a washer and dryer.

I will cherish in memory all my days the fun of this, my last, camping trip. That was the way we was.

My Loving Commando

I don't think I can get used to it. Hubby's "new look."

He very patiently took me shopping for little things this week. As we neared the men's clothing section, I suggested (for the fiftieth time that day) that he at least LOOK at the shorts. He badly needed shorts. He owned four pairs of shorts, all of which are fit only for the dumpster, but getting him to shop is harder than getting him to talk...

So I was delighted to discover him digging through shorts that were priced at $14.97, and actually trying them on. He tried on, oh, maybe SIX pairs! This is some kind of record...

And he bought two pairs of shorts. One, a nice khaki color, cargo style.

But the other pair is... well ....

Camoflage.

That's right - Camo.

He came out of the dressing room with these on, and I think he said something like "these are comfy". I didn't hear him.

My husband was wearing camo.

Where did this come from? Had the man I married been substituted while he slept for an alien? The fairies, they say, used to play tricks like that on mortals. In my case, it's more likely to have been trolls...

"What's the matter?" he asked me.

"They're camoflage," I squeaked.

"Yeah. ... And?"

"And... well, they're... camo!" I said helplessly.

He rolled his eyes and headed for the cash.

"Let me get this straight," I said, running to catch up to him. "You don't approve of hunting, right?"

"That's right," he said.

"Good, good," I said, grasping for the next idea. "And you still favour keeping guns out of ordinary people's hands, right?"

"Of course," he said.

"And you'd prefer if military force was truly used as a last option, right?"

"Yeah," he said, "What's your point?"

"Well," I said, flustered, "why on God's green earth do you want to wear CAMO?"

He shrugged. Just then, a young man brushed past us. His hair was unkempt, his cap on backwards. He had two tattoos showing through the holes in his t-shirt. He walked slouching. And he was wearing camo shorts - the very same shorts my husband had draped over his arm.

"Because," I said, pointing, "THAT'S what camo wearers look like!"

Hubby just gave me one of his "what-do-you-expect-me-to-do" looks and paid for the shorts.

Today, he took me out to see a movie. Wearing the camo shorts.

People looked.

I couldn't meet their gaze. I saw what they saw. A honking great bug hulk of a man, with shaved head, wearing camo shorts.

Oh yeah, nobody blocked our way. I wanted to scream at them - "It's not real! It's just a phase! He's not really bald, either, he just trimmed recently and the rest of his hair is grey! He's really quite intelligent!"

But I held my breath and dropped my eyes. I tried to get him to let go of my hand so I could walk behind him, but he was feeling happy and affectionate, so my hand stayed in his grip.

But what does it MEAN? Has Hubby finally decided it's time to crawl back DOWN the evolutionary ladder? Is he going to come home with an earring? A - gasp! - a tattoo? A - shock! - a BAD ATTITUDE?!!!!!

Perhaps I've finally pushed him over the edge. His humanity will slip away like sand through the fingers. I'll wake up one day to find his teeth also gone, tatoos covering his back, an empty bottle of whiskey by the bed and cigarette stubs on the floor. My hair will be long, tattered, and a dreadful bottle blonde. We'll be living in a trailer, and our dog will be a pit bull. We'll have a beat-up old pickup truck outside and motors and engines in varying stages of disrepair littering the ground. When I ask him a question he'll yell at me, and if I speak my mind he'll clobber me one, then clobber the dog for good measure. And there will be a Smith & Weston (whatever that is) somewhere. If it's a rifle, it'll be on the top of the fridge, which is where he puts everything now. If it's small, it'll be in the glove compartment of the pickup. And my life will be shortened considerably, since he'll put me in an early grave for bein' "uppity".

Hubby understands none of this, of course. He likes his new shorts. They're comfortable.

S h u d d e r r r r r r r r r r......

Onward!

So far today, 30¢ is my "take", but this time it's from vaccuming!

"We" went out this week to buy some organizational stuff, and this morning "we" put "our" collection of cables, bits & pieces, wires and other miscellany into one of these containers and (finally) put it away, under a dresser!

Whew! That only took 13 years...

This was in aid of (finally!) being able to pass the vaccum cleaner on that particular side of the bed. In the process, several bits of broken glass, some socks, some "toys", some medication, and thirty cents was recovered.

As you know, I have a "finders keepers" policy in this house. It doesn't apply to guests, I hasten to add! Anything a guest drops here will be faithfully returned... eventually... once we find it.... But stuff one of us drops carelessly to one side becomes the propery of the finder who is cleaning at the time.

(I think I've just figured out what my retirement savings plan is.)

At any rate, I re-discovered a great old song to vaccum by. "Onward! Christian Soldiers."

It made me cringe when I was one, and now makes me cringe even more, with its martial tone, and automatic assumption that "God is on our side." Gives me the heebie-jeebies, in fact, in its original context.

But I love re-purposing songs, and in the context of vaccuming, it's pretty near perfect!

... Marching as to war!...

$4.46, and one 1/4 inch nut driver

That's my latest "haul" from the laundry, the largest single win since I instituted the "finders-keepers" system fifteen years ago.

When I was alone with my teenage Daughter, I saw no reason why I should ruin my clothes because she couldn't be bothered to empty her pockets before putting her stuff in to be washed. She'd left a five-dollar bill in the pocket of one pair of jeans, and I waved it in front of her, snapped it into my purse, and never had to go through a pocket again. From then on, my "hauls" were limited to the very occasional kleenex.

That is, till Hubby arrived on the scene.

Try as I might, I could not convince Hubby of the necessity of emptying his pockets before putting his clothes in the wash.

Now, Hubby keeps quite a variety of things in his pockets. Screws. Bolts. Nuts. (That don't match the bolts.)

Elastic bands, string, washers, medication, pieces of paper with incomprehensible diagrams on them, electrical tape, scotch tape, masking tape, straws, packs of gum, tiny circuit boards, short pencils, erasers, dental floss, socks, car parts, wire, crazy glue, flashlights the size of quarters, fuses, orphaned keys, crumpled business cards, connectors...

He doesn't keep his wallet in his pants though - he says it makes his pants so heavy they fall down...

!?

I did buy him some suspenders around eight years ago. He said he didn't like the feeling of things on his shoulders, weighing him down. So the suspenders hang in the closet, and he treats the world to cameos of his butt as the day goes on.

But in the past ten years, he's never left money in his pockets. Not since the day I found, and pocketed, in front of his goggling eyes, a twenty dollar bill.

Let me tell you, THAT incident was noisy! And painful - for BOTH of us! But until today, quite effective.

Search how I might, in ten years his pockets have been bare once he's put them in to be washed. But he slipped. Today, as I began to load the washer, not one, but TWO pairs of pants still had their belts in them.

Now, leaving me something to do in the laundry, BESIDES the laundry, is a dangerous thing to do around here. The anger-meter goes immediately off the scale as I wrench the belts from their loops. But one pair felt just a little too heavy, I put my hand in, and lo! Riches beyond my wildest dreams were mine for the taking! Hee hee hee hee hee hee hee!

Well, $4.46 was now mine, anyway. Anyone want a 1/4 inch nut driver?