Short is not
a good cleaner-upper. For this, I blame
myself. I tried everything the books
recommended: sticker charts, rewards,
punishments, praise, ice-cream sundaes, wine (that was for myself when we had a
victory), and unlimited trips to Target (again, for me). Oh, how much easier it was to just say, “Short,
Hon, don’t worry about putting those toys away.
Mommy will make sure it gets done … hey, Tall! Wanna earn a dollar?”
And thus, I
have ensured a future full of both capitalistic ventures (Tall) and pawning
work off on others (Short).
But that is
not what this essay is about.
I want to talk
to you about Legos. Specifically, how
Legos break apart the second you touch them.
Or breathe on them. Or look at
them.
As I previously
mentioned, Tall puts his things away.
Short does not. The result is
about a million gazillion stray Legos pieces strewn about as if a nuclear bomb
made of (you guessed it) Legos went off.
Twice.
In our last
house, the kids’ play area was the basement.
The basement also served as the laundry room and family room. Really, why did we even need three bedrooms,
a study, a living room, dining room, and kitchen, when 99.9% of our living was
done in the basement?
This became very
problematic for me as a lifelong Virgo because I am one of those people who absolutely
cannot relax unless everything around me (in the immediate vicinity) is picked
up and put away. As you can imagine with
a two-year-old and a four-year-old, that never happened. I would get stressed out trying to “relax”
and watch TV when the kids had gone to bed because there were 10 loads of
laundry to fold and dozens of plastic trucks littering the landscape of my
basement.
This made me
sad. So we moved.
I told The
Husband that my number one priority in finding a new house was that the kids
have a separate area to play in that is not the family room and not the laundry
room. Who cares about good schools, a
nice yard, or walk-in closets? My
must-have list was short: a play area.
I got my
wish. The kids’ play area (we have
affectionately dubbed it the “toy room”) is a 13 x 17 masterpiece in lime and turquoise paint, and the kids love playing in there. It is directly adjacent to my study, where
(you may or may not already know this) I write my blog.
I can see
the kids play, they can see me write, everyone is happy.
Did I
mention I can’t relax until things are picked up? Did I mention that Short is not a good
picker-upper?
At 5 AM
today (when I first went to sit down at the computer), I could not take
it. The messy toy room was swearing at
me. Loudly. Against my better judgment, I walked in the toy
room with the intent of “straightening it up a bit.”
In Virgo
Land, this means putting everything away.
Things were
going well until I got to the Legos. I
have been a mommy for over eight years.
I am well-aware of how precious Lego creations are, and how very, very fragile. Over the years, many a heart has been broken
in my household when well-meaning Mommy attempts to gingerly move a Lego
creation but accidentally breaks off an essential piece.
You know
what comes next: I broke some Legos
merely be lifting them slowly and carefully and attempting to carry them to the
bookshelf. (I am hoping to get the kids
off to school without them ever coming in this room, so we can at least
postpone the inevitable meltdowns until later this afternoon.)
And now we
are at the title of this piece. This of
course got me thinking, “What if every single thing in life was a delicate as
Lego construction?” Imagine:
- “Honey, sorry—that sleeve just ripped right off your jacket when I picked it up at the dry cleaners. You can try to stick it back on. Oops, it’s upside down.”
- “I was going to reheat the lasagna for dinner, but all the knobs came off the stove. Oh, and so did the door.”
- “Speaking of doors, the basement door fell off. Again.”
- “You weren’t going to take a bath, were you? The tub broke in half when I was cleaning it.”
- “Yeah, I was going to drive to the drug store, but the steering wheel of my car came off. I tried to put it back on, but it just kept happening. So frustrating!”
- “Be careful when you make the bed, the mattress keeps breaking.”
- “Boss,
looks like I won’t be coming in to work today.
None of my shoes will stay together.
Every time I go to put one on, it breaks. Bummer.”
I think back to when we took the boys to the Building Museum last summer. There was a special Lego exhibit where highly-educated Lego enthusiasts who are on the museum payroll put together incredible Lego masterpieces to mimic famous landmarks. There was the Sears Tower, The Gateway Arch from Missouri, The White House, Frank Lloyd Wright’s iconic Falling Water, and many others that I am too lazy to google. They were all under glass or cordoned off with velvet ropes.
Tall stood staring at one of the “buildings” for a very long time. I asked him what he was thinking. “I was just thinking how lucky that Lego architect is. His mommy got that in here without breaking it.”
