”
Some days you are the statue, some days you are the pigeon.
”
– The meaning of life, according to me
I don’t suppose you’ve ever heard my favorite saying? Or maybe
you have. But that up there? That’s my favorite saying.
“Some days you are the statue, some days you are the pigeon.” – The meaning of life, according to me
I don’t suppose you’ve ever heard my favorite saying? Or maybe you have. But that up there? That’s my favorite saying. Unfortunately, I’ve been spending a lot of time lately being the statue – which I must say is not nearly as fun as being the pigeon. Also, it’s a lot smellier.
All of this I blame on my teenager. Because I can. Also because a very nice reader e-mailed me to let me know that scientists have discovered that during puberty, teens only use part of their brains. And apparently, the part they use is pretty darn useless.
To those scientists I say, “Duh.” I live with a teenager. I know he’s only using part of his brain – and not even the good parts. I didn’t need a study to tell me that. If you ask me that study was a waste of money. I would have told all those scientists about the lack of a brain in my teenager’s head for free. And so would most of the moms I know.
In fact, anonymous scientists, take the other day, for example. Our dog, No-no Lulu, has been eating something she shouldn’t. Something in the backyard or possibly one of my left shoes, I don’t know. But whatever it was, it didn’t agree with her – so she, er, let it all out on the carpet in Junior’s room.
Unfortunately for me, the rule in our house is that if you find it, you clean it. Now I am pretty certain that at least two other people in my house found the accident first. But one of them had to leave for work and the other one was doing his usual routine of sleeping until noon.
You can guess which one is the teenager, right?
So I’ll spare you all the details, but suffice to say after a bit of cleaning – which Junior didn’t sleep through, despite his best efforts – I got out my little carpet cleaner and special “pet odor and stain remover” soap and got to work on that carpet. And after a bit I realized that the stain was coming out but the odor wasn’t. So I went to rinse out the little bin on the carpet cleaner that holds the dirty water and start all over and that’s when I realized something horrible.
First, there was no dirty water in the dirty water holder doo-hickey. That was weird. I’d never seen it empty after cleaning. Second, the smell had followed me from the bedroom to the laundry room sink. OK, maybe that wasn’t so weird, but still. There was no dirty water in the doo-hickey, but plenty of stink.
And that’s because the dirty water was all over me.
Now you can imagine my joy at discovering that I, a freshly showered, blow-dried and dressed person was now literally covered in liquid poop. Yeah, I think you’re beginning to see how I’m the statue here, right?
After closer inspection, it appeared that the cap had not been put back on after the last person used the cleaner. So I did what any person covered in liquid poop would do. No, I didn’t rush to disinfect myself. Instead I started shrieking, like the gentle, refined shrew that I am. Frankly, I’m shocked they didn’t hear me in Argentina.
And when I was out of breath and my throat was sore, I racked my pitifully over-used mom brain to think about which one of the other two people living in our home could have left the cap off. Hmmm. Let’s consider. Do you think it might have been the guy driving to his job, where he uses his entire brain? Or perhaps the teenager who clearly uses only the most useless part of his brain? Let’s see. This is a hard one, isn’t it?
But after I freaked out, I took a deep breath. After all, I’m pretty confident I’ll be the pigeon – someday. As for Junior’s brain actually becoming fully functional? Sadly, I’m not so confident about that one. Does anyone know of a study that can prove it? Where are those scientists when you need them?
