cleaning up this mess

Today I had the lovely job of cleaning out the refrigerator. Yuck. There were left overs in there from the 18th century and lots of them had grown mold. I know, anyone want to come to dinner now. This wasn't I job I wanted to do, or one that I normally do.....I normally leave it for Josh. And yes, he does it, but not as often as I would like. So today I rolled up my sleeves and got to work.

As I was throwing out the green, fuzzy casserole that I don't remember ever eating it got me to thinking about how much I clean up after people. Two very specific little people. A lot! And yes I know it is my job to do that and someone, namely my mother, did it for me. In fact there are times she still does. But the job can be quite disgusting none the less.

There are plenty of times I want to just walk the other way and leave the mess for the "real" mom to deal with and then it hits me......the real mom is me.....I still don't know how that happened. The jobs like cleaning up toys, and the car after a long trip or a short one, the food off the floor, the dirty dishes after dinner, the vomit when they are sick (which has been a whole lot this year), the late night accidents in the bed, the leaky diaper at night, the messy diapers, the diaper explosions and the various other dirty jobs a parent incurs, make me want to sometime run for the hills.

I don't run obviously, but I do think about it. And really I'm not complaining at all, in fact I know one day all too soon, Meredith and Noah will be cleaning up after little people of their own. Hopefully they will one day have their own homes and pets that will need cleaning up after as well. And who knows, they may even have to clean up after me one day....although I hope not.

That being said, I sit here in disgust and unrest over the other, bigger mess we are leaving for them to clean up. Yes, the economy. I'm afraid this economy is only going to get worse and one day it will be a huge mess for our children to clean up. I hope they can do it and don't head for the hills themselves. God knows the government has no clue how to do it.