Living Proof the Deities Have a Sense of Humor

***WARNING: Serious religious irreverence follows***

Throughout recorded history, various religions have stories of believers asked to do impossible or painful things. Abraham was asked to sacrifice Isaac (or Ishmael, depending on who you ask) to prove his devotion to his god. Moses was asked to go back into Egypt to rescue the Israelites. Lot's wife was asked never to look back upon Sodom and Gomorrah. And that's just in the Old Testament...I'm not even going to go into the New Testament. And so we don't leave the Egyptians out, Isis had to go get all the pieces of Osiris' body after Seth dismembered him and threw him into the Nile. So, yeah, impossible doesn't begin to cover it.

But never did they get asked to do task like this.

Cleaning the bathroom. [insert dramatic music here :)]

Let me back this up. Anyone who knows us, knows we're not exactly great housekeepers. No, we're not dangerous---we don't leave chicken out for days in the heat and then try to cook it, we wash our hands before and after handling meat. But on the scale of Interesting Things We Choose to Do, cleaning the bathroom (or the kitchen) beyond just a very superficial, make-sure-we-don't-get-food-poisoning level, isn't on the list. Ever. And it takes...well, keep reading for what it takes to make us clean the bathroom.

Today, I got a very clear message from Someone that I needed to clean. No, no burning bushes or neon signs, just a feeling that Now Would Be a Good Day. So I did. I did half the dishes (half, because our drainer is small,) scrubbed the bathroom floor and banished the mold from the grout. Rob declogged the tub and the sink (for which he should get a medal...ugh.) And I almost drowned a spider of the non-lethal variety, but I apologized and Mr (Ms?) Spider seemed okay in the end.

So I've been thinking: why today? Why now? It's 90 degrees outside and not exactly fun weather for cleaning (or doing anything.) The best explanation I can come up with is this: it's spring, and when Someone says it's time, you listen.

And no, I'm not pretending that I was "meant to" do this, in the sense of heroic sacrifice or heeding a warning---I'm occasionally insane, but I'm not that bad. But I think I was pushed towards a recognition that everything has to change--whether it's my/our abysmal housekeeping, or just the way things have always been--and if cleaning the bathroom is the start of it, the best I can do is just hang on and go with the ride.