Monday, October 7, 2013

Theory of Messitivity

It all started with a broken dish.

I had just swept the kitchen floor that morning, and as we all know, the moment the floor is clean, something gets spilled or shattered on it. For us it's usually the former (99% of the time it's an entire gallon of freshly made iced tea), but this time I heard a crash. 
My husband yanked out a dish, and another dish (that was probably part lemming) decided to leap from it's perch and throw itself into oblivion. This particular dishware doesn't just break either- it shatters into a million itty-bitty shards- all over my nice clean floor. 

And of course, everyone is barefoot.

From the baritone bellow from the kitchen, It's my fault for having stacked smaller dishes on top of the larger ones. Not the guy who yanked out the dish in haste- Nooooo, not him! I was given a lecture about organizing (still being yelled from the kitchen to where I was on the couch), and while he was doing this, I kicked off my shoes in...um...joy, expressing my, um...appreciation for his, erm... helpfulness,  sneakers hitting the ceiling with a loud thud as I thrust them from my feet.

After the dish shrapnel was removed (with no injuries!), I replied in dulcet tones (that I'm sure the neighbors could hear), that perhaps he had a plan for solving this little dilemma, because stacking the big dishes on the little ones would defy physics. He said he would fix the situation that 'made' him break a dish while I put my sneakers back on and went for a walk to contemplate all the good things in life- and scoping out spots where I could hide the body.

I came home to a kitchen cabinet that was bereft of any extra dishes- the smaller ones were removed, as well as half of the larger dishes. Even the cups were downsized- apparently everyone was now on dish rations to two a day, and cups were color coded so we could only use our assigned color. At first I abhorred the idea, but after he explained his 'Theory of Messitvity', it really was quite brilliant.

No more taking a fresh cup when you want a drink- wash yours and refill.
No more taking a new plate for snack number twenty-seven, and leaving it in the sink.
No more having to run the dishwasher twice a day for a family of four.
Hand washing dishes won't take as much time, because there shouldn't be more than eight things to wash at a time, not including silverware.
Less clutter, less mess, and less cost on electric and water bills.

I could also tag who left what mess because of the color coded cups! That and the money we'd save on bills was the clincher for me. I forgave him and he said he forgave me too- for what I don't know- I just let that one go at the time. Maybe it was because my shoes dented the ceiling a little. Pfft.

The next day God let me know that it's not a good thing to lose my temper- apparently in my enthusiasm whilst kicking off yon sneakers, I overextended my knee. This happened late last week and I'm still limping. Serves me right for completely losing my schmidt over some silly dishes. Let's just say it was the hormones and leave it at that.

In the meantime, we only had to run the dishwasher once this weekend, and the kids are learning that color coding works better than NCIS when it comes to who made what messes- especially when their sibling (or mother) didn't clean up after themselves!


1 comments:

Sr Crystal Mary Lindsey said...

Well... No one is perfect! we all fail. I remember a visiting evangelist who told the story of a woman who introduced herself over the fence to a neighbour she wanted to invite to church.
Woman, "Hello I'm your neighbour, I just wanted to introduce myself."
Neighbour who could remember the many times she had heard angry shouting..."Yes, I recognise your voice."
LOL .. we don't always realise the witness we give to others.

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