Picking My Battles

Yes, this is a picture of a small piece of a goldfish cracker.  You're probably wondering what this uninspiring image is doing here.  Listen, everything can't be lovely stories and pretty fashion.  This is a blog with teens in the title -  you have to be prepared for the ugly sometimes.  

I first noticed the crumb on a Monday morning as I was blearily making my way downstairs to my office to start the day.  I stooped down to inspect it, and realized it probably landed there during my younger son's "bro" night over the weekend.

For some reason (remember, I was bleary), I decided to leave it and see how long it took before someone else in the house picked it up.  

As a point of reference, this crumb was residing in an extremely high traffic area of our home. This particular spot gets walked by at least 100 times a day.  And the crumb wasn't that small.

But walk by it they did.  For five days.  In all that time, nobody bent over to pick up the crumb.

Five days.

On the sixth day I gave up (plus, I really needed to vacuum).  I gathered the three men in my life for a meeting around the crumb and asked why no one had bothered to pick it up. All of them said they hadn't noticed it.  Sigh.

How is it possible that three intelligent, relatively aware people can completely ignore a piece of food lying on the floor for five days?

Because I am the lone woman in a house of slobs.  I looked up the definition of slob, and actually it doesn't apply.  My boys are neither dirty nor lazy.  They are fastidious with their personal hygiene, and their rooms are fairly presentable most days.  My hubby is downright OCD when it comes to organization and cleanliness. But I'm going to call them slobs anyway because it makes me feel better.

It's the little things in life that drive us crazy sometimes.  Like every single drawer left open in my younger son's room after he gets dressed for the day.  Does he really need an item of clothing from each drawer?

And honestly, how hard is it to close the drawers after you're done?

Or my older son asking, in all seriousness, why there needs to be a lid on the hamper. He asks because this is where his clothes end up every night, and I hassle him about it every night. 

Seriously, the hamper is right there.  You can't lift the lid and put the clothes inside? Actually, I might give him this one - is the lid really necessary?  Taking it off would solve at least one problem.

In my 19 years of parenting, I have learned that you have to pick your battles.  Apparently I have lost the crumb lying, drawer closing, hamper hitting battle.  In the grand scheme of things, it could be much messier around here.

Next time I'll just pick up the crumb myself. :)