If I have to pick up one more item of Cherub detritus, I will lose my mind. Last week we were all home for vacation. This week, our house is TRASHED. It’s been five days, and not only have I not restored us to a basic level of not panicking if someone knocks at the door, the filth has escalated to a point that I am holed away  upstairs in our bedroom/construction project, thinking, If I make things nice up here, maybe I can just leave downstairs to the savages…

There is scum and smell and crumbs and stuff everywhere. #1 Cherub’s room smells so bad, it’s leeched out into the kitchen. Last night I had him bring every single article of clothes he owns into the laundry room, because I’ve come to understand that his standard of “Oh, that’s clean…” and mine reside on different planets. #2 made this rice-in-a-sock thing in Home Ec that you’re supposed to heat up in the microwave to soothe hot muscles. I have no idea whose sock it was or where it came from, but it’s been on the coffee table in the middle of the living room since Tuesday, along with an earring, a hair elastic knotted with her ripped out hair, and the empty cover to Just Dance 2017.

Three weeks ago, #2 told #1 she would mend a hole in his soccer sock. So they left it IN THE DINING ROOM, UNDER THE KEYBOARD to await repair.

I’m not sure I’ve ever said or written this before. But I just can’t even…

This is driving me to apocalyptic pronouncements. We cannot all four be home for a week ever again, because the aftermath is simply too much. Someone will have to go to camp, or on a missions trip where you’re only allowed to bring two items of clothing, or on a grand tour of mowing lawns for all the grandparents. Whatever. I don’t care. But this cannot happen again, because while I love being a wife and mom, and I love our house and the people/creatures who live here, I never for one second wanted to be a housewife. This is the worst job ever. I did not marry this building. I did not vow to love, honor, cherish, protect (scrub, dust, vacuum) it til death do us part. And yet here I am, hiding on the third floor, knowing what lies ahead.

(And before you tell me to farm this out to our good Cherubs, can I just tell you that they both have housekeeping jobs they supposedly do for allowance. But they do them with such an extravagant flourish of half-assery that you couldn’t pay me to take a bath in our hair-product/AXE gel infested tub, or sit on our dog hair covered living room carpet, even in the moments immediately following their efforts. And sadly (or not), I don’t have the energy to add intense chore oversight to my  bitchy-mom workload.  I have only so much nagging in me each day, and right now every single nagging unit is claimed by the never-ending battles of Yes, you have to eat protein and No, you cannot wear that today.)

I’m more convinced than ever that household mess is a result of the Fall, just one more thing to blame on Adam and Eve and that stupid piece of fruit. “You want knowledge of Good and Evil?” The serpent asked. “Eat this…then you’ll have DUST and GROSS FILM ON THE BOTTOM OF YOUR TOOTHBRUSH HOLDER!”

Jesus said we should take heart when the world gives us trouble, because He has overcome the world. If anyone knows of a testimony where someone has overcome the scourge out household mess by the name & power of Jesus, LET ME KNOW. I’m game for a miracle.