Chapter 66
My mother-in-law tells about getting up and putting out a wash for a family of six or eight, then walking the two miles to school.
And she means a rub-born washer kind of washer, not a throw it in the washer kind.
And I have trouble getting my crew to put their dirty socks in the hamper.
For some odd reason they think they go under the bed!
I can well imagine the results if I yelled them out of bed in time to put out an old timey wash.
As it is, I turn on the bedroom lights and begin to talk…
Get up kids. Make your beds while I put breakfast on the table…
Breakfast!… Get up kids! Get those beds made!
… What kind of cereal do you want? Sorry we’re all out of ‘Go Fight Wolves!’…
Drink your milk, you’re going to be late…
brush your teeth… no, not when you finish feeding your fish!
Right now!… no, you cannot wear red socks with that purple skirt…
put that lunch pail down. It’s not a snare drum…
can you stop doing cheers long enough to get your hair brushed?
… I don’t care that you’ve only got eight years to practice before you can try out…
You want your hair put up!? We have all of ten minutes, child…
Have you finished feeding the fish and got those teeth?
What do you mean you can’t find your toothbrush!
?… No, ORANGE socks won’t match purple, either…
you found the brush in your duffle bag. It smells like what?
Have you got your books?… Time to go… Hey, you forgot your reader…
By the last week of school, it should be down to an art—turn on the light and like little robots they’ll all go through their routines. Then summer will hit and ruin it all.
Oh, well, I do have an automatic washer, and it is only a block to school. I suppose we can call it progress. But I think I know why my husband jumped at the chance to drive that morning school bus.