Viva La France!

Most of the time, when I get into bed at night immediately before crashing I think “uh-oh!” I’ve made a mistake. Why? Because I lay down which means things aren’t going to happen. All domestic tasks seem to require my presence to be done. The kids will do the dishes, but I have to stay in the room doing something else. They’ll help with laundry if I’m folding too. However, if the phone rings or nature calls or a child in another room needs assistance, the children conscripted into working rabbit out of my line of sight the instant they think I won’t notice in real time.

I’ve taken to preemptive warning shots. “I expect to find you here when I get back in two minutes…still working.” When they complain that I am a tyrant, I put my arm in my coat and say, “I AM Napoleon.” I've explained that everywhere the general went, there was victory. The problem, was everywhere the general wasn’t.

But today I looked at the paperwork, the work work and the housework that I’ve put off and off and off and off, and I know what time it is. It’s later. Like looking at the scale and knowing that TODAY, one must start a diet, it’s that later time when I should get to it. There’s one problem.

I don’t wanna.

Currently, at least 12 loads sit atop that eight foot long battlefield. It has begun to sag slightly in the middle like a worn out horse. There are six loads in the cue, one in the wash, one atop the dryer and one in, and 11 laundry baskets half full of folded stuff. And yet I wonder, how is it then that their drawers are full of clothing and yet everyone needs help getting dressed? Supply lines are always a problem for large armies. Napoleon faced such obstacles too, I wonder if his laundry tables were concave.

Doing the things on the later list rots. I don’t like diets, budgets, time managers, daily planners, to-do lists or even that much planning ahead. I don't shop for Christmas before Thanksgiving, I'm just that way.

So staring at the table hobbled with laundry, I came to the realization, I’m tired of doing all the jobs that no one else wants, of being the dutiful eater of leftovers and complicit flusher of toilets, sponger of messes, payer of bills and doer of the pots and pans and not the easy parts of any chore. I don’t mind creaming the butter but I'd like to pour in the chocolate chips occasionally. I don't want to be Napoleon anymore.

The Laundry is my Waterloo, and the basement, the whole Russian frontier. The blizzard of paperwork in the fall of 2009 doesn’t help either.

Looking at all the things to do, I have just one question.

How soon can I get exiled to Elba?

Tune in tomorrow when I rant about why there aren't 12 labors of HERcules. Answer: She's not finished yet.