Aug 12, 2022 4 min read

Reentry after time away is always tricky. I’m thinking of what the moon astronauts must have felt like hurtling toward the ocean at 6 miles a second in the Command Module, thinking, “Well, that sure was fun, but now it’s back to the real world, ugh.”

My time away last week was brief, but that was enough to get my mind out of work for a few days. I arrived home late on Friday and sat down at my desk Saturday morning. Officially, it was a day off, but work seemed to be hanging over me, and so I logged on to check email.

Oh, but first, I’ll do a load of laundry. My cycling clothes are sandy from the beach. OK, now back to my computer.

Lots of email. I’ll do the first one: hit reply, start to type.

Wait, my coffee is cold. I’ll head down to the kitchen to pour a little hot into it. Wait, what’s that? It’s the birthday card I didn’t mail. I’ll just slip on my shoes and head out to the mailbox.

Back up to my office, back to that email. The answer will take a bit of research. While searching back through old emails for the answer, I look down and see Smoothie sitting under the desk. Pet break.

“You’re a good boy, Smoothie.” Lots of belly scratches.

OK, where was I? Oh, the email.

Answer it. Next.

Wait, is that a hunger pang? Did I even have breakfast? No? Well, I can’t exactly work on an empty stomach. Down to the kitchen, bowl of cereal, fetch the milk. That top shelf of the fridge is dirty. Did something spill in there? Take everything off the shelf, wipe it down with a sponge. Return the sponge to the sink which, yuck, has something sticky on the faucet. Scrub some more. Head back upstairs to my desk.

Wait, is that a dog-hair tumbleweed sticking to the leg of the dining chair? Bend down to remove it, notice there’s a whole fluffle of dust bunnies under the table, which calls for the sweeper, which is in the garage.

Pull out the vacuum and see that box of family photos I’ve still not unpacked. Oh, look. There’s a cute one of the kids on bikes. They look so funny in their mushroom-cap helmets. Let’s pull up a chair and look through the box, but only for a minute because I have work to do. Oh, look – here’s one from the First Communion. Geez, what was up with my hair that year?

Advice columnist Ann Landers once said that no person who can read is ever successful at cleaning out an attic. Likewise, no mother who took literally hundreds of photos of her kids will ever completely finish unpacking the garage after a move.

OK, back to my desk, but it’s getting to be lunchtime and my metabolism isn’t going to jump-start itself. Go poking around for some protein and land on cottage cheese and a can of mandarin oranges. That pantry is a disaster. Spend 20 minutes reshuffling the cans and boxes. That was satisfying.

By now it’s after 1; I’ve been “working” for four hours and had answered one email. I doubt Neil Armstrong was a procrastinator, or he wouldn’t have been allowed to be an astronaut.

Me, I “worked” for another hour and then called it a day. So many chores dragooned me away from work. While at my desk I’d walked the dog, folded laundry, sorted my sneaker collection, played a bit of ragtime on the piano and pulled weeds growing by the front door. Oh, and I answered four emails.

And that, my friends, is how you keep a clean house.

Beth Dolinar can be reached at cootiej@aol.com.