We purchased our current house just over five years ago. It was sold in “mint condition,” so the only thing we intended to change right away was the carpeting. One mold remediation job, one new roof, one new bathroom and countless other unexpected non-mint condition expenses later, we are finally having that elusive new carpeting installed this month.
In a society where waiting the seven or eight minutes for macaroni to boil can seem like a tedious task, five years is a mighty long time. In a culture where student loans hang around longer than the initial job they gained, paying cash for a major expense is a major accomplishment. In a house where three children younger than 10 messily reside, having something new and fresh and wonderful feels like a miracle. Ahhhh, new carpeting!
Along with new carpeting comes new responsibility. Suddenly that food-stained, peed-on, pooped-on and, yes, vomited-on (just by pets, as far as I know) layer of the house we had come to completely ignore, other than our constant disdain for it, is of the utmost prominence.
The flooring we had consciously started beating up something fierce out of total disgust now demands the most delicate of care. I’m not sure we have it in us.
We’re not ones to take our shoes off upon entering the house. Actually, my kids all do out of their own preference, but I personally can’t stand the idea of it. My big ol’ feet are prone to toe stubbing and my high arches really prefer some form of constant support. As someone who is home much of the day, putting shoes on is also as close as I have to a “getting ready for work” routine.
I may be one of the few women on Earth constantly begging her offspring to stop taking their shoes off when they come inside. It’s not as big of a deal as when they were little and I had to do all of the tying and untying, but it’s still frustrating to pop in the house for a couple of minutes and turn around to see six bare feet when it’s time to leave again. Of course, it’s not quite as frustrating as when we all walk to the car shoed, but half of us are then shoeless when we arrive at our shoes-required destination five minutes later. Oh, the shoemanity!
I’m not quite willing to live a shoe-free inside existence, but I am willing to try to take the Mister Rogers approach and re-shoe myself at the front door. I may even go cardigan; I haven’t yet decided. I know the prospect of hideous germs lurking on the floor of my family’s home should scare the dickens out of me, but my microbial bravery is twofold. One, I have to assume that the potential contaminants and I already shared space somewhere when they latched onto my shoelaces, and, two, perhaps out of sheer cleaning laziness, I subscribe much more to the “exposure builds immunity” theory than its counterpart.
Still, I have an obvious vested interest in keeping our new prized possession as clean as possible for preservation’s sake. We are at least all (and by that I mean just my husband and I) agreed that there is to be no food outside of the Pergo-clad kitchen and dining room from here on out. We mean business too, unlike our meaningless “no food in the new car” rule that didn’t live past our it’s-9pm-and-we-have-yet-to-eat-dinner drive home from the dealership.
It did, however, only take a couple of days until we decided to play our grown-up card and allow ourselves to partake in coffee over carpeted surfaces. Coffee turned out to be a gateway substance that led to Panera takeout in our bedroom a day or two later. Again, we’re adults and can eat anywhere we darn well please.
Aside from the struggle to form better carpet care habits, there isn’t a whole lot of downside to new carpeting. Our 7-year-old, who could take or leave things like birthday cake and Disney World, was beside herself with excitement in anticipation of the new carpeting. Carpet day might as well have been Christmas morning in the eyes of our middle child. The girl is “meh” about french fries and most toys but went bonkers at the prospect of multi-colored frieze in her bedroom for some reason.
It was Christmas morning for me, too. There is something about the reward at the end of an extended wait, even if it is just buying new carpeting, that makes you feel like a kid again.
