This just feels like a good day to do nothing. When all my kids were young, that was not a choice, there were always a hundred things to do. But I have to go slow today because I went too fast on Sunday.
I had wanted something out of the attic above the big outside garage, where the steps are really narrow, and no one my age has ANY business at all going up them. So, as you might expect, I missed the last step (going up, luckily) and fell flat. Bruised up both knees, and now this morning the toe on my right foot is swollen, so I'm just going to sit around and think.
Home is a really good place for that, and that's why we all need to be really glad we have one
HOME IS A PLACE
Home is a place you live where nobody cares
if you don't make your bed
Home is a place to throw your coat
on the couch
a place
instead of being all cleaned up, sometimes it's just a mess
but it's OK
No one there will yell at you
and you know that some OTHER day
you'll clean it up when you're good and ready!
+
Home is steady
and there's a big back yard
where you can park a car you're working on
and it isn't hard to have a dog
if you've got a home
the two just seem to go together
and I think you need a Mom inside, or a wife
and it doesn't matter whether
+
you plan to stay in the house forever
or
if you're only passing through
+
A person really needs a home
just to know that you are
YOU!
When we used to live in Bountiful Utah, when Dee was doing his residency in OB/GYN we had some friends in the ward around the corner who also had 7 kids, so we were good friends. Her name was Corrie Assmus, and her husband had died so she was raising the kids alone.
One day I went to visit her, and the furniture in the front room had all been pushed back and in the middle was a sheet spread out, and a motorcycle in the middle all taken apart. I was amazed. A motorcycle in the front room? Here's what she said,
"Matthew is my only son, and this house is as much his as it is any one else's. It's cold outside, and he needs to fix his cycle. Why would I make him stay outside, just because he might make a little mess. Messes can always be cleaned up later."
A good lesson for me. Years later, in Fresno, we got a new yellow couch. The day they delivered it, so clean and beautiful (and me with 7 part time dirty little kids) that I got a clean king size sheet and covered it, so it wouldn't get dirty.
Dee came in later, and said, "Get rid of the sheet! When it gets dirty, we'll have it cleaned"
Obviously I hadn't learned the lesson yet. But I'm geting better now.
POLLY PERFECT
I, as Polly Perfect, used to scrub my kitchen floor
and wax it, with three coats of wax
and then I'd lock the door
and say
DON'T GO INTO THE KITCHEN KIDS
I WANT IT TO STAY CLEAN!
Poor Polly Perfect's children!
A mother who is mean is not as bad as one
who treasures houses with no finger-prints
Thank heaven!
Polly's gone away!
We haven't seen her since
she put priority in the right place
and
now she treasures kids
and not a straightened cupboard
where the pans all have their lids
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One day I was stressing about our home being messy, and Brad said - it doesn't bother me. It just shows that you've been busy doing other important things. Eventually one of us will have the time or desire to straighten up.
Karen's blog said...
April 16, 2008 at 7:09 AM
One day I was stressing about our home being messy, and Brad said - it doesn't bother me. It just shows that you've been busy doing other important things. Eventually one of us will have the time or desire to straighten up.
Karen's blog said...
April 16, 2008 at 7:10 AM