There are a lot of advantages to having more than one child. Hand me downs. Being able to work on the theory that “practice makes perfect.” The option of spreading your nursing home bill out amongst a few different people. But sometimes it seems that the disadvantages outweigh the advantages, especially when I find myself experiencing the worst kind of deja vu. I am speaking, of course, of having to go through two separate incarnations of the, “Please, for the love of god, just clean your room,” phase.
I hate these conversations, mostly because I find myself always sympathizing with their point of view. After all, their rooms are the only place in the whole entire world that they can call their own. The only place they can express who they are and what they are feeling at that moment in time, and sometimes, just like the rest of us, they feel like their inner self is best represented by Taco Bell wrappers and crusty socks. (Lord knows there have been plenty of times when I have felt that pouring the contents of my soul out would look remarkably similar to cleaning out my purse after a cross-country road trip: a horrifying melange of crushed breath mints, empty ball point pens and Starbucks receipts.) And yet, and yet, for all that I support the non-lethal expression of inner angst in the form of “dirty dish therapy,” the fact of the matter is that after a while the rest of the family gets kind of tired of waiting in line to scoop their morning cereal out of a pint glass with a fork.
I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, “Well, why don’t you just make a rule about no food in their bedrooms?” And yeah, that’s a great idea, and a great rule (one I follow in my own bedroom, actually), but the problem with making rules is that you then have to enforce them. And being an enforcer requires a certain amount of diligence and vigilance that I just don’t possess. At least when it comes to food in the bedrooms. Because, honestly, I don’t really care if they bring food into their bedrooms (see: expression of inner angst, taco bell). At least, I don’t care enough about it to have to perform the daily room inspections that would go along with enforcing the rule. (Or risk looking like an impotent blowhard who makes up meaningless rules. And if my “no food in the bedroom” rule is proven meaningless by my unwillingness to enforce it, maybe that means all of my rules are open to interpretation. I’m not saying there’s a direct link between ignoring the “no food in the bedroom” rule and the “don’t smoke crack” one. I’m just saying it’s never a good idea to undermine your own authority.)
In the same vein I really don’t care enough about their appearance or hygiene to enforce a “no clothes on the floor” rule—I do, however, care a lot when the concert is in fifteen minutes and the dress pants come out of the room looking like they spent the weekend getting backstage passes at Coachella.
I guess the problem really is that I want to have my cake and eat it, too: I want their rooms to be able to have the appearance of chaos, but I don’t want to have to live in a house where chaos actually has a foothold. Which probably makes me the parental equivalent of a hipster. Whatever: I’ve been called worse.
Which brings me back once again to the nice part of having done this before: I have tangible proof that even this shall pass. And until then: I guess I’ll just have to start buying thicker cereal. And a really good lint brush.