I am not sure if it was dumping the heavy weight of that empty hope or the promise I now can see, way off in the distance, but today, I woke up energized. It’s Monday, which recently became family day in my home. It also means chores, laundry, shopping and errands, but it is a day that my husband and I do our best not to work or make plans, making every effort to be present for our children. Today, that meant cooking lunch with my daughter and eating around the table. It meant laughs, real conversations, and connecting in a way that we have failed to do much in the last year.
At the end of the day, while my husband rested in his recliner and the kids flipped on a kids baking show, I grabbed an empty box and a white bag and headed to the hall bathroom. I have been avoiding this bathroom all week, walking past it to use the bathroom in the master bedroom. My daughter is nearly a teen now, and that means curling irons, blow dryers and hair accessories are in abundance in the bathroom she calls hers. The vanity is small, lacking in counter space, so a few items left out makes the entire space look cluttered. But she doesn’t leave just a few items out, so rather than cluttered this space looks like chaos. And I think you know by now, I don’t do chaos!
The time came to stop closing the door and to tackle the excess in this room. Box in one hand, bag in the other, I walked in. I started with the small, mirrored cabinet above the toilet. The first thing I saw was this beautiful bar of soap that I bought my daughter from a little boutique in Washington several years ago. It was a dusty pink soap, marbled with sparkles and color, and it smelled lovely. It was one of those soaps that felt too special to use, so I understood why, several years later, it had been forgotten about on a shelf.
I made my way from the small vanity to the medicine cabinet to the cupboard and drawer. I found several half-used tubes of toothpaste with no lids and an abundance of used toothbrushes. This room felt a little bit like purging someone else’s stuff because most of it was my daughters. I did my best to weed out the things that were obviously not allowed to stay, and then had my kids help me make a few decisions. All told, I removed: 2 hair brushes, 1 blow dryer, 27 toothbrushes/toothpaste/floss, 1 old loofah, a shower cap, my daughters old retainer, 4 partially used bottles of bath gel, 1 broken candle holder, a razor, 3 rolls of medical tape, a paper bag full of wound care items from an invasive surgery I had in November of 2020 (I counted the bag as one item although it probably had 40 individual items in it), 2 used bars of soap, a door knob, and a few other miscellaneous items. In total, I purged 55 items from my bathroom, bringing my new total to 593.
As I was closing the door on the small cabinet, I noticed a sign sitting on top that read H-O-P-E. I’ve been toting this sign around for more than eight years, but as I looked at it tonight, it became illuminated. I see it all the time, but I have not noticed it in years. I have not read it since I bought it on clearance at a local discount store. But tonight, as I read it, a smile crossed my face. I said the word out loud, “Hope.” And then I reached up and adjusted the sign and I made a mental note to read it more often.
Last night, I purged hope. Tonight, I purged 55 items from my bathroom and I found hope sitting on a shelf.
Uncommonly Common Mom 