the lies we tell ourselves

I am a clean person: therefore, I only need to clean my bathroom once a month. I am a clean person: therefore, I only need to sweep my floor once a week. I am a clean person, I never need to clean my oven. I have lived quite well with this philosophy for the past six years. But children-- especially babies-- have ways of seeing through your lies. You can tell yourself that your bathroom is clean but then Baby will crawl behind the toilet and reemerge with old toilet paper in her mouth as if to say, "Aha! Explain this if you will, "clean" Mom!" And you don't notice the pink rings around your bathtub until Baby starts emerging from bathtime with strange rashes on her body. You believe that your floor is perfectly clean, or at least clean enough, until you notice Baby sucking on a-- what is that....OH MY GOSH! WHERE DID SHE GET THAT SHARP SCREW? Or better yet, what happened earlier this week when I had finished changing Baby and came back to find her chewing on a little blueberry. But wait, we don't have any blueberries....is that chocolate...NO! THAT'S NOT CHOCOLATE! THAT'S POOP! And once again, I find myself asking how any baby survives to adulthood.