I stepped on another Lego last night walking into the darkness of the toy room after putting in a 12 hour day at work. Because I still had on my shoes, the piercing plastic corner did not impale that tender spot on my foot’s arch like it often does.
Since my husband had the kids (picking up our oldest from wrestling – another article for another day), no one heard the expletive I shouted.
Now, understand … before I had kids, I had clutter of my own, because I – like the horders on that show we’re all too ashamed to admit we watch – attach an unreasonable amount of sentimental value to stuff. In our house, stuff sprouts up from windowsills, mantles, nightstands, until the stuff sprouts stuff.
Quick! What do you call a clutter bug WITH kids?
Someone YOU don’t want to live with!
My husband and I actually got into a fight last Saturday morning when he lifted the battered Crayola art easel into the bed of the truck to take to the dump. I spotted him from the kitchen window, and marched outside in my slippered feet. “What are you doing with that?”
"It’s been sitting outside since August. No one’s used it.”
“It costs $75 new, and the girls still like it. Look! It holds their giant paper with this clip!”
Even I had to admit that the once shiny new easel had morphed into a moldy, warped shadow of itself due to water damage, having spent its last few months of life outside, suffering through lesser storms and then Hurricane Sandy.
“You’re right,” I said. “It’s trash. But WHO brought it out here in the first place?”
My husband furrowed his brow, thought for thirty seconds, then said a little too smugly, “You did. You brought it out for Beth because she wanted to paint a picture of the trees, and you said it would be like French open air painting. She painted for ten minutes, and it’s been sitting out here ever since.”
“Oh. You’re right,” I said, unhappy that I’d have to redirect my self-righteous fury at … myself.
There are four broad categories of "Kids' Cutter" killing me in our house today:
1) Handwritten: art, projects, school papers;
2) Plastic: little parts like the Legos or even worse, pieces that – once separated from their larger components – are completely unrecognizable to anyone over the age of 10. Usually, these Unidentified Plastic Objects (UPO's) get trashed right around the time one of the kids who knew what they were wants to attach it to the now useless "mother ship";
3) MISC. clothes: the errant sock, the thirteenth jacket, and your child’s favorite (stained) Tshirt that he somehow manages to wear – and then toss on the floor – every single day;
4) Toys of Endearment: no one ever plays with these but Mom won’t let them go. Until recently this included our container of Play-Dough and Play-Dough toys. In the quay for discard – Lincoln Logs. The hardest ones to part with – the ABC fridge magnets that, when clicked into their receptacle by our then-chubby fingered toddlers, sang, “Every letter makes a sound ... K says Kuh for Kids!”
Ridding yourself of this last kind of clutter is an emotionally charged decision since it means accepting a bygone era … my children are growing up, which is just what I always wanted until it happened.
But maybe someday when they’re older – and nostalgic about their youth – you will be the mother who can show your daughter every single finger painting she ever created, and who knows? If she becomes a professional artist, those smeary yellow suns might even be worth some cold hard cash that will help pay down her college loans.
Like many moms, Kathy drives a mini-van full of booster seats and Disney/Pixar DVD’s. When she’s not killing herself on a minefield of Legos, skillfully scattered by her kids, ages 10 and under, she teaches for Prince William County Public Schools, writes fiction, poetry and this column about the challenges and rewards of being a mom to young children.
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