Friday, October 21, 2016

Dusting by Milou Koenings



I don't usually let mess get to me.  But I do like things clean.  (There's a difference between piles of paper spread out on a clean table, and piles of papers strewn over half-eaten apples and candy wrappers, after all.)

Francois Shnell, cc-by-2.0


The trouble with being a "clean-nik," as opposed to a neatnik, is that it is a losing proposition in a houseful of kids. At the end of the day, there's never enough time to make everything as sparkling clean as I would like it. Scrubbing bathroom tiles always comes in a last when it’s a choice between that or feeding the troops, making sure they have clean clothes, and getting to bed before midnight. 

As for dusting... let's just say that when I was waiting at the dentist recently, rereading an old Agatha Christie mystery that had been left there, and the detective in the story noticed "day-old" dust in the murder victim's home, I laughed out loud.

So there I was, one evening, duster in hand, trying to polish up our living room, despairing that I can never get it as perfectly clean as I would like.

In a moment of frustration, I looked at the stuff on the hutch above the china cabinet and exclaimed, "I'm getting rid of all of this. All it does is collect dust."  I grabbed the carved owl statuette that my mother had given me the day I got my first job after college. "I'm packing this up."

My beloved came over and took me by the shoulders. "Stop." I was turned around to face the three shelves and their ten or so knick knacks. "Do you know what I see when I look at this?

"That's the souvenir we bought that day at the crafts fair..."  Yeah - fifteen years ago. It was a perfect day. Just the memory made some of my tension melt.

"That's what your mom got you when you got your first writing job — and that other owl, that was also a gift from mom.

"This tree of wire and stones — the kids were so proud to have made that. And this jar from my grandmother's house, it reminds me of all those visits to her. The seashells? Didn't we have a wonderful time when we took the kids to the beach? They were so happy! That brass candelabra from your grandfather, I know how much it means to you.

"You know what I see when I look at this? I see our life, our family. I see our home.  And I hope it is dusty. I hope it's full of dust. Because that means we're far too busy taking care of our kids and each other and living our life together, to worry about a little dust."

Well.

What could I say? Except I'd just fallen in love all over again.

You might still find me waving around my duster late at night, but now each time I walk by that hutch and spy some dust, I can't help but smile.


Milou Koenings is a USA Today bestselling author. She writes romance because, like chocolate, stories with a happy ending bring more joy into the world and so make it a better place. 




Her Green Pines sweet romances, Reclaiming Home and Sweet Blizzard are available on Amazon and Amazon.uk








You can find her on her website,www.miloukoenings.com, on TwitterFacebookPinterest, or Instagram.

4 comments:

  1. Fun post, Milou. It's difficult to part with precious keepsakes that bring back such wonderful memories. What's a little dust? :)

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