So I was folding clothes the other day, chatting with Sebastian: "I think I am going to post about my OCD next." He looked at me puzzled: "Wait, what is that again?" Me: "You know, the thing when you are like extra organized, like Over(the top) Careful Disorder, or something like that..." He: "Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder..." Me:" Yeah, that." Seb: "Um, HOW does that apply to you?"
I was severely offended. I know he is closing in on his better-knower teen years but being so rude and eye rollish was entirely unnecessary. I grumpily continued crumbling the clothes into each other and then throwing them on a pile. I briefly contemplated separating the clothes according to kids but that is way too difficult and time-consuming. Who knows what officially belongs to whom. Obviously the pink stuff is Gigi's but the rest is up for grabs. It's kind of like the boys' underwear. It's all in one big basket in my room. They can just grab whatever they want from there. Genius, isn't it? And to top it off my boys are even much further organized than me. They- amongst themselves- divided the underwear by brand. That way, whatever is HANES belongs to one, while a different brand belongs to another, etc. They are genius. I worry about THEIR OCD futures often.
Anyways, I realized I was being watched and as I looked up I saw that Sebastian was still staring at me. "What." I grumbled.
Seb: "You are quite serious, aren't you?"
"Yup."
Seb: "MOM, how is that even possible?"
Me: "Well, at the stores they ALWAYS comment how OCD I am."
"Umm, you consider that a compliment?"
"Absolutely. Like just yesterday. I was buying a bunch of clothes at Old Navy. And before I handed them over to the sales clerk, I took them off the hanger and laid all the clothes on the counter. I organized them by kid, pants and shirts, color and size. And then I organized the left-over hangers by color of the little tag on top and by pure hanger or pant hanger and I offered them up to the lady and she just wordlessly waved to a box. Then she swallowed hard and said: "They get organized somewhere else. They will just get messed up in the box again." And then she gulped again and started busying herself with folding the clothes very very neatly. I suggested to her that she bring a couple more boxes and I would organize the hanger boxes under every register for them. For free. She said she'd have to call the manager over for that. I said she was making too big of a fuss over my free offer which was too rude for me to deal with and left.
THEN I made it to Party City. I bought 124 single pieces of Christmas candy. I put them in a basket and proceeded to the checkout. I had two separate piles, some for the 7cent candy, some for the 10 cent candy. When I got to the register I nervously glanced at the salesgirl and told her I HAD to organize them by kind. She said she could just count. I insistently told her again that I had to organize them. She said OK, after questioningly glancing at the manager who was behind another register inflating balloons.
I proceeded to separate the Santa clauses from the snowmen from the wreaths from the bells from the Hershey's kisses from the balls from the candy canes from the mint patties. Etc. You get the idea. The manager rang up 7 other customers in the meantime. Then I handed each of my 14 categories to her individually telling her how many of each there were. Then she asked me if they should all be in separate bags. I rolled my eyes and said: "Of course not."
Sebastian: " I think you are a bully when you are in public."
Me: "WHAT??"
"Yeah. I've seen you organize the magazines at the dentist's office. You always know better and have to show them how to organize but then you get home and you forget ALL about it."
Me: "Our house is spotless-ish. Whenever there is stuff I clean it."
"Yeah, by stuffing it into closets."
"That's not true."
"Oh, and the garage. Didn't the gardener suggest you try out to be on an episode of "Hoarders"?"
"Shut up. Whatever."
