Fall. More than the changing of the leaves, Fall is the season of the changing of the clothes. This weekend, I dug into my sons’ closet and drawers to see what I could see.
I have found that poking around in your son’s anything is an adventure similar in size and scope of an archeological dig the size of say – Machu Pichu. But this weekend I was struck by something even more fascinating. What I discovered was just how different two boys in the very same family can be from one another.
My discovery is not new. Parents everywhere have pondered this particular curiosity since, well, since the beginning of time.
I started with my youngest son. I began by weeding out his shirts into color piles and from there sorting out the shirts that he never wore. “Why don’t you ever wear this?” I asked him holding up a perfectly nice, red, striped hand-me-down from the Gap. I already knew part of the answer as the red shirt pile was third to the last in his ranking of favorite to least favorite color. “It has stripes,” he said as if everyone but me knew this and I should have figured it out way before now.
OK. So the young son is anti-stripe. This poses a serious problem because the oldest just happens to be pro-stripe. Problem noted – must infuse more stripeless shirts into youngest son’s future wardrobe. And, why didn’t I figure this out before? My youngest is the one who on picture day this year wanted to wear a bright yellow Hawaiian button-down. He also goes to get his hair-cut saying, “I don’t know how I want it cut. I think I’ll look in the book first.” Situation noted.
This job didn’t take long. My youngest keeps his drawers and section of the closet neatly organized. Everything is in its proper place. I don’t have to step over anything or shove anything out of the way to get there. My oldest, on the other hand…..
After I kicked enough stuff aside so that I could actually see both of his drawers, I opened them. Inside was a jumbled mass of blue, orange, brown and green. I’ve given up long ago trying to keep the insides of these drawers neat. I fix them twice a year when it is time to change out his clothes and get ready for a new season. Other than that, I avoid this area of the room entirely.
After pulling everything out – including a few Legos, a football and several bouncy balls – I peered into the bottom of the drawers to make sure that every corner had been emptied. I looked closer. And then I pulled both drawers completely out and turned them upside down on the floor. “How did the hamster food get into your drawers?” I asked, knowing the answer. “I don’t know,” he said – eyes riveted to his DS. I rolled mine. I can only pray that he marries an organized woman.
