February 12, 2007 by Amy

Mustgo

I’m getting into my mode again, which is resulting in a massive effort to clean things up, clean things out, and cross things off the “things to do” list. You know my mode. Where I say, “We have too much crap!” and I start getting rid of things. M runs and hides his toys when I get into this mode. I’ve got a warning for you, buddy: the RC helicopter that has resided, unflown, on top of your dresser for the past six months is about to go. And no, flying it tonight does not grant it a pardon, temporarily or otherwise.

My current mode could be because things have finally settled down from the holiday/wedding season.

It could be because I’m sick of looking at the piles o’ crap sitting around my house.

It could be because M goes in for shoulder surgery tomorrow and will essentially be a one-armed man for at least a month, leaving me to fend for myself with keeping the house clean and keeping my family fed. I’m okay with the first thing, not so good with the second. M is the chef in our family, and I’m sweating bullets with him going out of commission. “Hello, Imo’s? I need to place an order…”

Peaks and valleys are great, because they make life interesting. It would be pretty damn boring if everything just maintained an even keel all the time. We wouldn’t have the opportunity to put a gajillion lights on our house and invite 60 of our closest friends and family members to turn it all on for the season. We wouldn’t get to have many evenings filled with love and laughter, reconnecting with family from out of town. We wouldn’t get to stand up for Beanie and Shawn as they got married, simultaneously reaffirming our own wedding vows and faith in the sanctity of marriage.

We wouldn’t get to live a real life without peaks and valleys.

Now that all that livin’ has settled down, though, it’s time to kick some retentive butt and open a can of organizational whupass.

Yesterday I got my house picked up and my bills paid, and I was finally able to get my 2007 Statements binder underway. I don’t know how ya’all sort your bills, but we in Dorkville use the binder system. I love three-ring binders. Love them. So all our bills, paycheck stubs and statements go in a three-ring binder every year. Each section has its own tab, so you can quickly get to all your Ameren bills in hurry, say, if you wanted to see how much money you saved on your electricity bill by being without power for days on end.

I love looking at the shelves in our utility room and seeing the Statements binders for the past seven years lined up like little soldiers, solidly shouldering our entire financial life. Yeah, say that three times real fast. “Soldiers solidly shouldering…” Ahhh. I love alliteration.

It also comes in handy when your engineer husband asks for some obscure piece of information from a few years ago.

Yes, I do realize that I’m creating co-dependency here.

Anyway, last night I also got my laundry done and a ton of other little nitpicky things that just keep piling up, so that when I finally collapsed into bed I felt like I accomplished something.

When I get in this mode, this mode of cleaning everything out, I’m reminded of when I was a kid and my mom would have “Mustgo Night.” She’d tell us dinner was ready, and we’d arrive to find the kitchen counter covered with steaming Tupperware and casserole dishes. Little bit of this…little bit of that. Nothing by itself to constitute a dinner for four, but together enough to feed a small army. She’d clean out the fridge and announce, “Tonight, everything must go.” Hence: Mustgo Night.

Note: in St. Louis parlance, this comes out sounding like, “Musko Night.” Just FYI. In case you ever hear me say it.

Zozo News: She’s got another tooth coming in. Halfway to the back, on the top, on her left. You can feel it and everything. Which, by the way, she doesn’t care for. I had an inkling something was coming in, because she would crunch Cheerios against something back there and I could hear it.

She’s also demonstrating just how much of a stubborn little cuss she’s becoming by refusing to walk on her own. Oh, she can do it. We know she can do it. We’ve seen her do it. She just doesn’t want to. She’s thinks it’s far more fun to watch her parents coach and cajole. M and I sat on the floor in the library this weekend, across from each other, and tried to get her to go between us. At one point, she was standing near me, bent over at a 90 degree angle, holding on to M’s hands, refusing to walk and laughing all the while.

M is convinced that she’s practically running from one end of her crib to the other when we’re not in there. Judging by the noises coming from her room sometimes, it’s either that or she’s doing cartwheels.

Welcome back to Beanie and Shawn!!!