Joys of parenthood We had a domestic crisis yesterday. Between us, my wife and I did about five loads of washing. Now that is a lot of laundry any family’s language. We have a big washing machine too. There are two problems we have had to address. The first is the use of bath towels. There has been a juvenile mentality developing this year that a bath towel is something to be used once then discarded on the floor in the hallway. The next time one is needed, which might well be on the same day now that our small swimming pool is open for fun and games, all a child thinks it needs to do is go to the bathroom cupboard and grab another.
No amount of ranting by us parents has solved the problem. The indignant reply is always, “It wasn’t me!” Well enough is enough! Yesterday matters came to a head and we had to launder 23 towels. Fortunately it was a good drying day. Late afternoon my wife took a photo of me staggering back into the house with a massive pile of folded towels. Now they are locked up safely in Santa’s Cave. The rule of one towel a week is to be strictly applied. I am bracing myself for the dramas which will occur. We also provide bath mats, but some individuals feel a towel does a better job on the floor, especially if it is someone else’s.
The other clothes problem is mainly from our teenage girls. They share a room and have a large collection of very nice stuff. Trouble is they are like Paris Hilton. They reckon she is pretty cool chick when it comes to makeup and fashion. So their clothes might be changed several times a day, and then are thrown on the floor. A day does not go by without one of us parents requesting a tidy up, especially when their stuff starts to spill out of their door. We are always polite about this. Well at the start of negotiations we are always polite. Trouble is that politeness doesn’t work. No it doesn't – never! Blaming someone else is their routine strategy. So the stress factor ratchets up over the next half hour or longer until we parental ogres think of some diabolical threat sufficient to bring about the required action.
You might notice that many young female fashion models have a surly look of their faces. It is because their mums and dads make them clean their rooms.
There is another problem here and that is the use of drinking glasses. Some years back we installed a drinking fountain in a pleasant, shady spot the back garden. This works very nicely. The water is always clean, cool and refreshing. But many of the kids would rather come into the kitchen and use a glass. So there is always a few dirty glasses to be washed. Well lots of them in fact. I find this infuriating. I spend a lot of time at the kitchen sink and like to leave the kitchen spotless. Our version of spotless anyway. It would probably disgust the head chef of a five star restaurant. I might finish the job and go away for five minutes. When I come back there is a sink full of dirty glasses again. Another thing which gets my goat is if I have a sink of hot water and some clown comes along for a drink when my back is turned. They grab a clean glass then run the cold tap water into my hot sink. Then do they wash their glass? No way mate. Well after all, why bother when you have a slave.
Sometimes I am lucky enough to have some kid wash the dishes. This is never voluntary. Apart from my wife, no one ever walks into the kitchen and says to themselves, “Oh look the dishes need washing, I will do them for Mum and Dad.” No goody-goodys here. Even when we do manage to coerce someone into the task there is always a whine. “But I did it yesterday!” is one popular pleading. There are others. I sarcastically respond, “You like to eat don’t you?” More often than not, the job is not done properly and I have to do a few items again.
The toilet is another place of contention. The forest workers of the world can rest easy in the knowledge we are doing our bit to use up as much toilet paper as possible. At least one roll a day, probably two. In the name of conservation, I urge the kids to use both sides of the paper, but do they obey me? Of course not. Last Saturday I found a whole roll in the toilet bowl. It had sucked up most of the water and so had to be thrown out. No one owned up. I found ten cents too. That was lucky. Strange how money doesn’t flush away. It will go back into circulation. Thousands of people will handle it not knowing where it has been. I remember as a kid my mother saying money is dirty stuff, “It might have been at the bottom of a toilet.” It’s a true urban myth.
Also I would like to find out who it is that doesn’t flush the toilet when they have been for number twos. Nothing like discovering a blind mullet loafing in the bowl. Again the universal plea of the innocents, “It wasn’t me.” Arghh!
Fortunately, most toilet habits improve with age here, but not in one particular aspect. It seems no one except me is capable of disposing of the cardboard tubes from the centre of toilet rolls properly. Instead they are thrown on the floor and left there – that is until I can’t stand them any more. I got down on my hands and knees yesterday and recovered 14 of the things.
We have a medicine cabinet in the bathroom. This is the place where you can’t find the tweezers when you need them. It is where near-empty cough syrup bottles and Goanna liniment lurk. It is also the mother–lode for band aids. These are the adhesive strips certain hypochondriacs in this family apply to wounds that don’t usually need them. As per the long established routine, the paper wrappers and their red rip-threads are then thrown on the floor, along with the cardboard tubes.
Well I gotta go now and put on another load of laundry. Consumers of KFC will be pleased to know that our three part-timers never go to work unless they are in a clean uniform. The kids actually get paid a laundry allowance. I will have to have a word to them about passing this on to their slaves.
© MMIV Paul R. Weaver.
About the writerCheck out the index of my "common-man" monologues about survival in 21st century Australia – plus a little history occasionally. An original essay is added most days.
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