Didn’t think it was possible, but I’ve become lazier
And the best lesson learned came from a five-year-old
I am discovering things about myself during this pandemic that I’m not sure I’m happy to find out.
I am the laziest person I know. I am glad I don’t have to explain why I don’t want to meet for a coffee. I am happy not to go to Toronto for a one-hour meeting that will require three hours of driving and 20 dollars for parking. I don’t miss live music, I don’t like going to theatres and I can’t tell you the last time I was in a mall before the lockdown.
The most surefire way to get me to clean the house is to invite people over. Not relatives, because they know the real me. But having a dinner party was a great way to make me clean. No dinner parties, no cleaning. About the extent of things now is when I run around with a Lysol wipe in my hand cleaning as many doorknobs and baseboards as I can until the juice runs out.
I’m in the “don’t-buy-things” part of my life. I spent 20 years clearing out what my parents left behind in the house (and garage and shed and basement), and when I pretended to sell the house back in 2017, I did a pretty good job purging much of my own accumulation. I am determined to not let the things sneak back up on me. We collect too many things.
You know the “keep, toss, donate” theory you’re supposed to use to declutter? You need to believe me when I tell you, when you’re dead, that toss pile will be towering. Flip side, I think children who leave home should have one year to clear out their yearbooks, sports equipment, and old computer gear. A neighbour of mine re
cently boxed up a whole pile of stuff and shipped it to his kid on the west coast. I asked if his son knew he was doing this. “Nope,” he smiled. It’s not harsh; his kid moved out there more than 20 years ago.
But shopping is like a muscle. If you don’t flex it once in a while, your skills atrophy. At some point, the kitchen is getting new countertops from reclaimed granite a friend salvaged, which is awesome. It means I had to shop for a new sink and tap — something that is years overdue. I stared at the options and was immediately overwhelmed. Friends had done a reno last year, and I loved their sink. I called and asked what it was, found the same one, and ordered it.
On the same page, at the bottom, there was a section called People Who Bought This Also Bought This Other Thing. There was a tap shown. Well, I thought, if everybody else is doing it, so will I. I added it to the cart, and was now finished in 10 minutes, something that might have taken me a week or more in the old days. My mother was right about peer pressure. I just hope the Other People measured and made sure that tap would fix that sink, or I’m doomed.
The pandemic has made my world smaller, but it’s also made it simpler in many ways. I don’t mean just the elastic waistband fashion statements I make every day; I mean what I really miss, and what I really cherish. I miss my people, the boisterous Sunday dinners that have always been “come as you are and come if you want.”
When Christopher was small, I’d ask him what he wanted for his birthday. And every single time, he’d ask for the same thing: family dinner. He never asked for presents, he only wanted family dinners. He wanted his people.
Everything I’ve discovered from a pandemic I’d already learned from a five-year-old.