Reason to Vacuum

So, I once had a friend--well, OK, I still have a friend, but she once said to me, "I can't believe you vacuum every day." (Keep in mind she was a previously-working, first-time mom who said at the start of her maternity leave before the baby was born that she was getting someone to come and clean the house "because I'm sure as heck not staying home to clean!" and who thus never used her vacuum herself, as there is almost no need in a house with two adults, one baby and more bathrooms than people--each bathroom gets used the equivalent of one person-day per week at that rate, and for that she needed someone to come clean? I could have done that cleaning while a baby is switching breasts...) I pointed to the crumbs on the floor after a feeding frenzy called "lunch" and said, "Sometimes more than once--what choice do I have?"

"Why bother? It's just going to look like this anyway tomorrow, so why not just leave it?"

I stared at her, dumbfounded, trying to remember she had not yet experienced a child who eats more than milk as I choked out, "Because if I didn't vacuum, by tomorrow this would not look like this, it would be TWICE as much food and dirt on the floor, plus rats!"

I admit, my standards have been worn down somewhat--I don't vacuum every day because I no longer have that automatic lull known as Nap when I can do a quick tidy and vacuum of the playroom/kitchen, make myself some lunch, and watch Law and Order in grown-up mode for about 38 minutes. Now the playroom is four times as large as in the old house with four times (almost) the kids and mess, I don't need to clean it up to be sane because I don't eat lunch in there or watch TV in there and sanity is a lost cause no matter how clean the playroom is anyway, I don't get to watch L&O anymore because there isn't a time when all the non-school-aged kids nap simultaneously, and I'm just a little more tired and lazy than I used to be in the cleaning area. And now that I have folks coming to clean half the house every two weeks, I admit, sometimes if it isn't THAT bad and no guests are expected I have occasionally gotten that "it can wait till the cleaners come, can't it?" attitude sneaking in.

Only, we have two dogs now, and we have a Timmy.

Timmy is not officially a toddler as he is not toddling yet, but he does hippity-hop (an odd form of mobility that is not crawling but gets him from here to there fast enough) and cruise (for the non-parental, "cruising" means standing up and moving while holding on to things--essentially, walking sideways with handholds) and explore. And so the dirt/dog hair becomes an issue.

I'm sure you think I wish to protect my little wee one from the perils of dog hair, dirt, and fallen foodbits he may come across, but not really. Unless it's a wad of hair or a half-eaten carrot or something else he could possibly choke on, I'm not that concerned for the child. Yes, his hands are constantly on the floor, and yes, they are also constantly in his mouth, but this is, I'm convinced, how babies are naturally supposed to build up strong immune systems--why else would God have put dirt and babies on the same geographic level of creation?

No, my concern is really for the environment. It's about wasted water.

Toddler-to-be explores. Toddler-to-be takes out bowls, cups, assorted unbreakable things that to good mother has put in the lower cabinets and drawers just so he can open doors and safely explore to his stimulatory delight. LOTS of bowls, cups and assorted unbreakable things (think how many cups and plastic containers for leftovers alone a family of nine might have on hand, add in measuring cups, mixing bowls, the holiday cookie cutters you can never find a good spot for, and every bright plastic anything that isn't actually a toy you can throw in a bin just so a baby can play with it, then multiply it by how many years experience you don't have running a household with kids and you might have half the idea). Toddler-to-be is very happy, very cute, very oh-look-at-his-development-happening-right-in-front-of-my-eyes as he dumps and distributes all the contents of all the cabinets all over the kitchen.

At some point, though, you have to clean up, and this is when you find out just how well dog hair is attracted to plastic.

Is there any item you might eat or use to prepared food that isn't covered in dog hair if I failed to vacuum in the past five minutes? Nope. That means everything--as in EVERY, SINGLE, THING--needs to be rinsed off. IF done in the sink, it takes up more than the sink, more than the dishdrain, more than all the counter space I have, while if I use the dishwasher it would require starting with an empty dishwasher and dedicating it to rinsing all these items when there's already a backlog of actual "dishes" waiting to be washed. Either way, it's a grand use of space and time and effort I can ill afford.

And as I tell the younger kids when they want to play with the faucet indefinitely, we need to leave some water for the fish. When I have to rinse off every plastic item Timmy can tear out of the cabinets, the fish are getting very worried indeed.

So this is why I now vacuum every ten minutes. I do it for the fish.