Loving the spots

By Tara Williams

I was vacuuming up crushed cereal in the living room when I noticed that the carpet was riddled with little (and some not-so-little) spots. My first thought was, “What kind of torture monger covers an entire house in cream carpet?!”

Then, as I was running the vacuum over the same black spot for about the hundredth time, my frustration subsided and turned to loving acceptance. “Oh, well,” I thought,” at least you can tell our house is lived in.”

My family would never survive in one of those “museum” houses where everything is spotless and in perfect order. You know—the type of house where you are afraid to sit on the couch because you might squash one of the perfectly placed “throw pillows”? Yeah, that’s not our house. And that’s OK with me.

As much as I try to contain messy food and drinks to the kitchen, that doesn’t always happen. Truth be told, it rarely happens. I mean, really, what fun is a popsicle if you have to stand still in the middle of the kitchen to eat it?

And what about coffee? I carry it all over the house with me, all morning long, and sometimes it gets kicked over, dropped, sloshed, dribbled, the subject of all sorts of exciting spillage routines.

So, yes, my active family will continue to live in our house. Maybe one day I’ll attack the “well-loved” areas with a little Resolve…but not today.

Tara Williams lives in East Brainerd with her husband and daughters. Read more of Tara’s random thoughts on her blog, Vacuumusing.blogspot.com.