My fingernails are perfect.
Due to unforeseen circumstances, I have been a “house husband” for the last couple of weeks, and it is starting to affect me. My fingernails, once battered, proud homes for tool grease and yard dirt, are now evenly cut and oddly whitish in hue. And that’s not all.
I know where all the dishes go.
I understand how to wring out a wet mop.
I can change a diaper – while eating a sandwich.
But my inexorable decline into metrosexuality hasn’t been without a few bumps.
Early on, I discovered that a dishwasher is not, contrary to common perception, a limitless box for dirty dishes. Eventually you run out of room and actually have to empty it.
I always thought that dirt disappeared into the floor after a few days. Apparently this is not true.
Despite eye-watering technological advances, we have not yet discovered a way to empty a kitchen trash receptacle without having a human in the loop.
The floor is further away for older parents than for younger parents. For me, each toy requires the formation of a bend-down-and-pick-it-up strategy…and more importantly, a stand-back-up strategy.
But the experience, however painful, has taught me a few things that I can use later in life.
For example, a dog will eat almost anything thrown on the floor.
All clothes can be washed together, if the final product isn’t that important to you.
If a dish is dirty but looks clean, it’s clean.
“Vacuuming” is a colloquialism for “picking up toys.”
Luckily, I haven’t yet sunk to the next level, in which you enter the the world of Oprah and eyebrow pluckers. Soon enough I will be free to return to my pre-house husband ways, and life will get back to normal. But I think this experience has been good for me. I have grown. I have matured.
And I have some fine looking fingernails.
6 Comments
Teehee! My Dh’s job is the trash and the dishwasher. I always remartk while he’s tdy that the dishwasher is broken. It doesn’t magically empty anymore. It is annoying.
Sorry for whatever circumstances have thrust you into the land of what we are stuck doing everyday. 🙂
Btw, get one of those things that you use to grip and grab items from high shelves. It’s perfect for picking up toys from the floor. Until the little buggers graduate to legos, then they can either pick them all up themselves, or loose them to the Dyson Monster.
My brain is like oatmeal !
Jeff, did you start humming that song that goes something like “…with deep spray on tan and creamy lotiony hands, ya can’t grip a tackle box.” ?
SC: As a matter of fact, I am a big Brad Paisley fan. So yes. Although I try to concentrate on the, “I’m still a guy” part.
I think you should work on “…my eye brows aren’t plucked, there’s a gun in my truck…” part!
Pingback: Broadside Blog - Military Times – Doing my part to keep English alive