9 dirty socks, 8 empty, crushed bottles of Poland Spring, 7 multi colored sticky guitar picks, 6 wrinkled, stained t-shirts, 5 blankets, on the floor of course, keeping a 5 week old dried doody log company, 4 drinking glasses fused to the nightstand, 3 crusty forks, 2 empty family size bags of Doritos, an empty, archival container of chicken... or pudding, hard to tell, and probably 1 dead partridge somewhere, which I assume used to live in some sickly, withering pear tree.
This is my sons room. Well, not the picture above, but that's what it feels like. Walmart's Day After Christmas Sale.
(The anal retentive in me had to make sure you knew that.)
However, I think it's safer to assume that canoeing through the Amazon river, sans malarial shots, is less deadly than it is to embark upon a seedy journey into my son's room to change a lightbulb. Whatever the deal, I'm sure I should've called the CDC before I volunteered for helping out with something this categorically cootified.
(The anal retentive in me had to make sure you knew that.)
However, I think it's safer to assume that canoeing through the Amazon river, sans malarial shots, is less deadly than it is to embark upon a seedy journey into my son's room to change a lightbulb. Whatever the deal, I'm sure I should've called the CDC before I volunteered for helping out with something this categorically cootified.
In nature, there's a fascinating bird called the Bowerbird. The male Bowerbirds collect and artfully arrange color and object specific collections to attract a mate. And the males with the most spectacular displays in their lairs, win the female. The collections are varied things ranging from piles of nuts, heaps of specific flowers, piles of dead beetles, heaps of deer shit, and even color coordinated garbage. It's a trait fascinating for a bird from Papua New Guinea. And a borderline repulsive / heave worthy trait if you're a human. If my sons lair were the basis for any long standing relationship, it would only attract the head custodian of a hazardous waste removal company, a senior archeologist, or a herd of protozoologists. You shouldnt need tongs to clean a bedroom.
I'll try and give you a better visual: If his room were the first thing you saw when you opened the door to your house, you'd immediately smack the security alarm button, and call the cops because you'd think your house was ransacked by an irate band of bat wielding meth addicts that had a particular hankering for 2 week old ham and cheese sandwiches during their heist. And then you'd find the nearest shovel, pick it up and swing it around every blind corner you turned, hoping to bring whoever did this to their knees.
I'm a little nicer than that. I don't use a shovel. But I'd be lying if I said yelling with flailing arms, and a cattle prodder weren't involved.
A total pig sty. I have to say 'pig sty' because thats what my mom always called it, so for nostalgic reasons, filthy room must under all circumstances, equal "pig sty". I've never really hung out in an authentic pig sty, but I can promise you this; there's no loose leaf binders stuck to the walls there. And about the dried dog poop on the floor that I found-- pigs will at least eat shit. My son just leaves it there waiting for the fine art of disintegration to show us how it's done.
So on second thought, it's not like a pig sty at all, It's more like the 'after' scene of a Fall Out shelter, where someone forgot to install the door.
Bottom line is, unless you enjoy the sensation of deli meat caressing your scalp, laying on the remnants a 3 day old turkey sandwich is not an acceptable substitute for a pillow.
I guess the ability to live amongst viruses and newly unearthed species of cream colored fungi are one of those teenage milestones I just have to get used to. But how could it not bother him. You'd think that rolling over to go to sleep, and crushing nachos with your ear, or pulling up a blanket, but not being able to, because the gum and soda you spit out 6 weeks ago has welded the sheets to floorboards, would force upon him some type of personal intervention. I'm sure this is how the first Glue Trap was invented. Walking barefoot onto a teenage boys bedroom floor. Then I think, eh, stop complaining. At least it's still just gum. Innocent, little fruit scented gum. I seriously dread the day that used condoms become part of the harvest.
Thankfully, he does shower every day and spends more time coifing his coif than Justin Beiber ever did.
But showering is clearly his ploy to make his friends think that his cleanliness factor somehow infuses the rest of his life as well. And that he doesnt fall asleep on Village Bagels # 6 sandwich. Well ladies, let it be known that this cleanliness ends as soon as the last bubble encapsulating his filth goes down the shower drain. The waterlogged towels are thrown to the ground, where his wet, stanky clothes will lay for days, mulching into crop fertilizer.
But showering is clearly his ploy to make his friends think that his cleanliness factor somehow infuses the rest of his life as well. And that he doesnt fall asleep on Village Bagels # 6 sandwich. Well ladies, let it be known that this cleanliness ends as soon as the last bubble encapsulating his filth goes down the shower drain. The waterlogged towels are thrown to the ground, where his wet, stanky clothes will lay for days, mulching into crop fertilizer.
So once more for clarity purposes: The showers are merely to fool the women. Not THIS woman, of course. The other ones. The ones who dont have to blow torch his underwear off the floor.
Now I don't expect a 12 or a 9 year old boy to have the same level of fastidiousness as their slightly anal retentive, moderately OCD, stain removing, rug cleaning, toilet scrubbing, sink bleaching, laundry doing, stink removing house maid of a mom does, who showers three times a day, periodically gives the vacuum cleaner attachments herbal baths, and rearranges the magazines so they stack in the proper descending color spectrum.
But I do expect him to know that when the sheets crack, it's time to wash them.
I finally decide I can't do it anymore. I walk into his room to make my last plea for cleanliness, but wearing socks now for protection. We make a truce. Sign peace treaties. Chest bump. And I walk out. I feel a cool breeze on my feet. I look down and see my socks are missing. I turn back and see that I walked out of my socks, because they're stuck to his bedroom floor. Stuck to the floor like 2 dead war flags waving in the toxic wind. Symbolic of my futile efforts.
So before I fall victim to some rare airborne e coli saprophyte, I'd like to extend an early apology: In the event of there being a sudden resurgence of the Bubonic Plague, or some other virus where your skin and appendages melt off and my kids indirectly wipe out your entire family, I'm truly sorry. I tried. I really, really did.
