50) Leverage Makes it Better

“Yeah but… we don’t want to….”

“And I hear your words, I do… but like it or not… this IS happening today…”

“But it’s hot.”

“You’re right. Which means that the sooner we start this shit, the sooner we can be done with it….”

“UGHHHHHHHHHH….” They groaned in unison.

You’re eldest was most opposed to the entire ordeal. He was leading the charge in the quickly escalating mutiny, your only hope: to quash it immediately.

“Guys… come on… you finish this and you get 24 hours of unchecked, unmitigated, brainrot… I’m just asking for a couple of hours of hard labor… not even hard really…”

“That’s a lie…” Your eldest chipped in.

“Which part?”

“The ‘not even hard’ part…”

“Well it’s technically not hard…“

“It’s gonna take forever…” your middle child chimed in…

“Listen… it’s not going to take forever… it’s just going to take a bit…”

Your eldest coughed into his hand what sounded a lot more like, “bullshit,” and a lot less like coughing. You glared in his direction… he was all big blue innocent eyes… as he shrugged his shoulders and mouthed, “WHAT?”

You ignored him and moved on… something you found increasingly difficult to do the closer he crept towards teen-dom.

“Now listen up guys,” you were going to rally the troops, boost morale; “let’s just pull together, make it happen, and then we’re done and you get your screen fix… I think that’s more than fair…”

The two youngest were nearly convinced…

“And what if we don’t do it and just buy our own time with Snickels instead…” Snickels were a form of a non-monetary coin reward system where they could buy screen time and rewards with x amount of Snickels. Your daughter’s nickname was Snicket… hence the term Snickels… a cross between her moniker and a five cent piece.

This kid was good… you weren’t sure what the world held for him but project management, general contractor, attorney… they all came to mind… especially if he could delegate to someone else. Especially his younger siblings.

“You can’t buy extra time with Snickels…”

“You said we could. So basically then they’re worthless is what you’re saying…”

“I didn’t say that… I just said that you can only redeem so many at a time and you can’t redeem a full day’s worth…”

“So then how many CAN I redeem…”

You were getting agitated… it was getting hotter. You were going back and forth with an eleven year old kid who was doing his best to get out of doing his part to help clean up his stuff.

“IT’s GETTING LATE! CAN WE JUST START ALREADY?” It was your middle, not necessarily trying to choose sides, he was great at playing the soother, the middle man, the keeper of peace, he was just sick of listening to you and your eldest go toe to toe.

“Exactly!” You’d take the easy way out… even if it was your nine year old leading the charge.

“This sucks!” Your eldest lamented.

“Quit being such a problem, let’s just do it…” your middle child chimed in again.

“I’m ready to help, mommy!” Said your youngest, ready to go… reporting for duty…

The four of you got to work as the clock ticked and the temperatures climbed. Months ago David had applied a temporary four square court in the sanctuary using painter’s tape. Now each of the three kids got a numbered square that coinincided with their birth order. The fourth square was for anything they decided to donate.

The mission was simple: empty all drawers and boxes into their square, sort through it; whatever fit neatly into the nine old dresser drawers, they each had three in their own color, could be kept out, everything else would have to be packed back up into boxes to be stored until their rooms were completed, or go into box IV… the donate pile.

They started off slow. Too slow. You could feel your blood beginning to boil as they bickered and your eldest bitched about how hot it was and your youngest kept petting the cat and your middle child kept walking off, conveniently forgetting that you all were working on a massive undertaking.

“How about we get some music up in here? What would we think about that… make it like a fun dance party?”

“Oh cool… it can be loud AND hot in here… awesome…” said your eldest sarcastically.

You ignored him and grabbed your ipad, pulling up YouTube for some music. A quick scroll through and you found your favorite playlist of the moment… oddly enough Ai generated music… you turned it up as loud as it would go.

“How about that guys?” You said enthusiastically snapping your fingers and sashaying to the music.

“Still feels pretty hot in here…” groaned your eldest.

“Can I pick the next song, mommy?” Your youngest wanted to know…

“No, we’re not playing DJ… whatever comes on next, comes on… that way we can stay focused…”

“Worst dance party ever…” your eldest huffed. He refused to be entertained by anything but the notion that he might finish this quest soon.

“I mean you can always just make it easy on yourself and donate everything…. If that’s where you’re at…”

“Cool, so I dumped everything out for nothing then… I’m taking a break!”

Your two youngest agreed and they all went downstairs to cool down.

Upstairs in the sanctuary you were left with a mess of boxes and toys and all the random stuff one manages to accumulate in a lifetime of, ‘one of these days I’ll use this.’ That day STILL could come. It was hot. It was really hot. You were sweating, you could feel your wild hair getting frizzy and thick, sticking to your scalp in cool sweat and a growing paste of thickening dust.

You were thankful that you had opted to don the black nitrile gloves. There was something about touching paper, dust, cardboard, that made your stomach churn. As an artist you found that comical. “Can’t even touch fucking paper without cringing…”

When you started The Great Sanctuary Clean of 2026, you were hopeful that it wouldn’t take nearly as long as it was proving to take… four hours in though and The Great Clean was feeling a lot less great and a lot less clean than you would have imagined.

“Where were those kids?” You wanted to know.

You dug through boxes that had been carefully packed when you were 13. You didn’t remember being told to do it, you were just ready to pack up all your old toys and start the teenage years without the dolls and Cabbage Patch Kids and the My Little Ponies…. Now you were moving the same boxes again…

“To what end Vaness… when do you let this shit go?”

You didn’t have an answer.

Some parents passed down old Hallmark plates with commercialized Norman Rockwell art and decorative tea cups, you were giving your kids all of MATEL circa 1986-1996. They could do with it what they wanted… which probably did not involve sorting it in a church sanctuary.

When your kids finally made their way back upstairs they were surprised and a bit bummed that you were still at The Great Sanctuary Clean of 2026… “Come on guys, you had a nice long break, let’s get back to… wait… what is that on your head?”

“Ice packs. It’s too damn hot in here…” said your middle child.

“Let me see that!” You said, holding out your hand for the pack that he was trying to mold to his head.

“Here.”

You took it and jammed it into the waistband of your shorts, the cold sending a spasm up your bare spine.

“Ewww gross mom… like I even want to use that now….”

You shrugged and got back to work, not before stripping off your shirt and tossing it into a pile of dirty clothes. You were hot, you were sweating, your hair looked as if you had undergone shock treatment and now it was very clear that you smelled awful to boot.

“Come on guys… let’s just finish…”

Seven hours in, god only knew how many ice breaks, water breaks, squabbling breaks, and bathroom breaks later and you were about as done as you were going to get. All the boxes had been consolidated, condensed, packed, repacked, and donations sorted… all you had left to do was to carry everything in to the basement storage room.

Lucky for you though… you only had one fully functioning arm… the other was still relegated to lifting nothing more than a coffee cup. Which meant that you could pass the baton to David and the kids to take up The Great Sanctuary Clean of 2026 on another day. You were done supervising… you were dog tired, you stunk, your sweat was sweaty and you were pretty sure that it was at least 91 degrees in the sanctuary.

While you weren’t done, done… things were looking far better than when you had started and as much as you poo-poo-ed the kids’ relentless pursuit of all things screen time, at this juncture you didn’t necessarily mind the leverage. With that carrot they had upheld their end of the bargain and you were fairly certain that they would not have stayed in the game otherwise.

It wasn’t lost on you that one day you all would drag these boxes out again… maybe another 30 years from now, and shuffle, reshuffle, pack, unpack, consolidate, then find another spot for them all again. This time though, they could mutiny and bitch and moan all they wanted… as it would be their ship to sail (just with a lot of your shit still stored in the helm).

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The last time the sanctuary was this empty was about an hour after we had started carrying our belongings in here almost a year ago… it’s crazy to see it getting emptied out again. I’m looking forward to having this wide open space ready for events or a good roller skating session!