Few normal, everyday events have the power to thrust me into a foul mood more than walking barefoot on a dirty floor. Especially a hardwood floor encrusted with parrot fodder. Especially when it happens fifteen feet away from the parrot’s perch.
I also hate sweeping and mopping, though. These rank super low on my list of Pleasurable Domestic Duties. What an unfortunate combination of personality traits, eh?
Introducing our bird, our only inside animal, Bobby Pacino….
“Wannabite?”
You can just call him Pacino. Or Peekaboo. He recently turned six years old and is a really good and loving boy through and through. But he is messy. I mean, he is like a toddler crossed with Animal from the Muppet Show in the middle of a tornado. That kind of messy.
And while cleaning up after Pacino is not difficult per se, it is a tedious job that needs to be done frequently. Which translates to, “It gets put off a lot.”
Like any job that gets put off, this can be problematic. Maybe I can get away with not sweeping for an afternoon. If I scoot his perch a little bit away from our walking path, maybe the floors can even wait until tomorrow.
But that causes terrible things to accumulate beneath the loveseat. And eventually we are all padding around the living room, shaking empty sunflower seeds from our bare feet. Or cursing the dried red peppers in the adjoining room’s carpet.
My last act of defiance against cleaning floors is tiptoeing through the now thickened blanket of seeds, elusive white under feathers, and cracker crumbs that radiates out from Pacino’s throne. By day two of procrastinating, I lend to my trek across the lower level of our home the same energy you might give to navigating a minefield. This causes my tension to mount rapidly.
Almost as soon as I realize we have reached this extreme yet again, I go find the broom & mop. Ten minutes later the hardwood is restored to safety and smoothness. We are walking upright again, no longer wasting time, energy, and peacefulness on avoiding this very natural part of life.
What are you actively avoiding today? Don’t be like me and spend more of yourself on avoiding a job than you would spend just getting it done already. Bite the bullet! Do yourself a favor and fast forward into completion while you are still smiling…
“The fastest way through a problem is solving it.”
~Author Unknown
Thanks for your indirect motivation, Pacino!
xoxoxo
~Momma
xoxoxo
~Momma
Oh, those boxes in the garage are my parrot mess today. Fine! I’ll go bring them in.
Dang motivational bloggers anyway …