The trouble with clean

It seems like I spend half my time cleaning up the same messes over and over.  Messes, I should add, that 90% of the time have nothing to do with me, aside from the fact that apparently I am the only one who is able to see them*.  The rest of my time I spend walking around the house turning off lights and flushing toilets.  I mean honestly, what in the world do my children have against flushing the toilet? 

It's not a bad life, it's just...frustrating...disheartening...discouraging...to see my effort undone so quickly, even effortlessly.  Curse you, entropy!  And friends, I am certain that I could do some amazing things if I didn't have to spend all my time cleaning up messes, turning off lights, and flushing toilets.

You know what the problem with cleaning is?  Well, aside from the obvious--its never-ending nature?  The problem is this: no one notices when something is clean--they only notice when it is dirty. 

Can I get an amen, sisters?

Never, ever in my life have I heard, thanks mom for all the clean clothes in my closet.  It's always, moooommmm!  Where's my soccer shorts/tie-dye shirt/favorite pants/I don't have any clean underwear.  No one ever says, wow mom, the living room floor looks so clean and freshly vacuumed.  It's wow mom, there sure is a lot of popcorn on the living room floor.  I don't even eat popcorn, so it's definitely not my problem--why are they telling me instead of getting out the vacuum?  No one ever comments on how clean the windows are, just how amazing it is that light can still penetrate all the fingerprints and dirt.

I recently spent almost an hour scrubbing the fronts and doors of the base cupboards in our kitchen.  I wish I was exaggerating on this, but I am totally not.  Almost an hour--approximately 7% of my awake time for the day, more time than I spend showering, getting ready in the morning and eating all three of my main meals combined (which, and let's be honest here, is the full extent of my self-care in a typical day)--of scrubbing away drips of who-knows-what that have mysteriously appeared over the 7 years of us living here.  And our kitchen isn't even all that big.

And do you think anyone noticed?  Um, that would be no**.  A big fat no-sirree-bob.

See what I mean?  No one notices clean, but they sure as heck notice dirty.

So, why do I do it?  Not sure, my friends.  I am just not sure.

* This is so exciting, friends!  I've discovered my super hero power--mess seeing!  Sure it's not as sexy a super power as invisibility, or flying, or morphing into animals, or having a lasso of truth, but it's mine, all mine :)

** Actually, there was someone who noticed--me.  I suppose that is why I do it, because I notice.
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Curse you, mess seeing super power! ;)

Whatever you do, work at it wholeheartedly

as though you were doing it for the Lord

and not merely for people.

Colossians 3:23