Dishwasher water on kitchen carpet...aaahhhh
dayeanu, that brings back awful memories! Hugs, hugs, hugs! Are you going to have to replace the carpet? Some of that old kitchen carpet is pretty sturdy and cleans up well, others not so much. This just happened to dso's mother, except it was her jammed garbage disposer that shot icky food particles and disgusting water all over her wall-to-wall eat-in kitchen carpeting. I'm not sure if she got it professionally cleaned, or if she plans to simply replace it, but she loves her carpet!
My parents installed wall-to-wall carpeting throughout the main/living floor of their house in the late 70's, including the kitchen, laundry/utility room and half bath, plus ran it up the stairs and throughout the upper floor hallway and landing. It wasn't made-for-kitchen carpet, though. Prior to that they had dark red-brick pattern in the kitchen, dining, laundry/utility, half bath and entry hall, green short-loop carpet in the living room, and bead board flooring in the family room.
If you recall, we were in the midst of a recession, and OPEC and some political machine resulted in large gas price hikes. We kept the thermostat on our propane-fed furnace at 64-degrees Farenheit, plus the house had 22 single pane, double-hung windows, 4-inch studs with not great insulation in the outer walls, wooden front and back doors with glass inserts, and an unheated basement with two uninsulated garage doors. The floors were COLD and it was chilly and a little drafty inside.
My parents, along with many other people back then, believed the carpeting throughout would make the floors feel warmer, which it did. However, they bought a short shag in a dark blue color splashed with a confetti of dark brown, gold, green, black, and a deep red - to help "hide" the dirt until it could be vacuumed each day. I think most people with carpeting throughout their homes often used a different carpeting just for kitchens and baths in those rooms and their laundry areas.
They also thought it would be easier to vacuum carpeting than sweep and mop. We swept and mopped the eat-in kitchen after every meal. Both parents worked full-time, helped at my grandparents farm, had several young children, and led busy lives with extended family and other activities. Sweeping every day and mopping at least once or twice each week in every room besides the kitchen was a huge undertaking, both time-consuming and a lot of effort. The carpeting could be vacuumed in about 10-15 minutes every day in the high traffic areas, and furniture moved and vacuumed under everything every week in about an hour. I had the pleasure of doing this particular chore, and had it down to a science.
I remember the dishwasher overflowing all over the carpet, and the washing machine did the same thing. We used a wet-vac, then a Rug Doctor or clone - can't recall. Lots of work, and the carpeting never looked or felt the same afterwards. Short shag back then, of the medium-grade variety as ours was, crushed into a matted down mess within a few weeks after cleaning. Vacuuming was a bear afterwards.
Gosh. Thinking back, I usually recall our home as always cluttered, always dirty, always in the process of becoming messed up. I also remember it as clean and always in the process of being cleaned up. It was a never-ending battle. Actually, it became really cluttered and dirty every day because there were many people living there, but we did an enormous amount of daily cleaning, plus deeper cleaning and decluttering every Saturday morning and tidying and sprucing up every Sunday evening.
It was a never-ending battle.... It really WAS a never-ending battle. It was a NEVER-ending battle. It was a never-ending BATTLE.
Some of us made more messes than cleaning, others of us cleaned more than making messes. Not always, but often enough to cause hard feelings. There was dysfunction in some ways. Epiphany in the works here? I know this stuff, so it's not as if I am uncovering some buried memory of unacknowledged trauma, although some of it was traumatic. Why do I consider it to be a battle? Perhaps partly because my sibs and I fought a lot, and I was the oldest and held more accountable for cleaning their messes and preventing them from making messes... My dad yelled a lot, so it felt like fighting, though I rarely said a word - that would've been considered back-talk, which we knew better than to do.
Hhmmm, there might be a light-bulb moment in here somewhere. Cleaning house is not a battle. It's not, even though it may feel that way at times. Decluttering and cleaning a hoard can be construed to be a battle, maybe a full-on war. I feel as if I am at war with this mess, and it has been kicking my patootie all over the place.
I need to give this more thought. Meanwhile, I am off to face the paper monster in a game of PaperPlay. I'm actually very good at this game, when I am ON my game. Right now, my muddled thinking and emotional stuff (fear aversion? I dunno) makes it impossible to think clearly or remember HOW to do some simple things, plus I seem to be terrified of making a few phone calls to figure out how to take care of things I've never had to handle before.
Maybe if I put on my game face, some of my muscle-memory and mind-memory (whaaa?!
!) will kick in and I can make more decisions and take more action without really having to think about them as much as I think I have to. I think.
Gah. Ummm... More like...
Anyway, I'm working on my second cup of coffee, and already ate a quick breakfast snack of cheese danish (I know - sugar, but I didn't feel like taking time to cook and clean breakfast dishes. I'll eat a good lunch.). I took dd to early practice before school, I've dried and folded one load of laundry, washed another load, and put that in the dryer and will fold it and put it away when I finish this post.
I cried yesterday over a couple paper things. I'm going to try not to do that today. I am more than my trauma, and I can beat this beast at its game. Go, me!