Chores are inevitable. But in my childhood I considered them parental torture.
This less-than-sunny attitude didn’t turn out a stellar work product.
I was constantly trying to figure out shortcuts that would get me finished faster so I could go on to do what I had originally planned before the chore-jacking.
Sometimes the shortcut would actually work, and I’d brag. “Look Mom, I figured out an easier (or faster) way to do it!”
The response was always the same: “Well, there’s the easy way (pause for profound effect) and the right way.”
Mom’s words sound like these options were some kind of diplomatic choice, but they were not. It meant there is only one Right Way. Ignore this, and rinse and repeat the chore.
Thus we went, round and round, until one day, I saw the wisdom of their Right Ways. I also realized that there was an option missing from my Mom’s choices — the Hard Way.
To this day, I’m a big chore-doer, still tweaking, planning errands that run in a seamless loop, reducing waste and doing it all in one trip, even if I happen to drop something.
A lot of time I don’t find the Right Way — but the Hard Way has its allure.
The other late July night I was struck by the urge to gather the berries I hadn’t gotten around to harvesting yet. True, I’d just pulled into the garage from work in my office-casual attire, darkness was falling, the winds were kicking up and a storm was building. The weather, including the barometer, felt like deadline pressure. It was a bumper year, the raspberries were huge, juicy and plentiful, as were the mulberries, with limbs on the trees and bushes swollen and heavy. I pictured the wind cracking the berries off their tether like the last kid in a line of ice-skaters.
This was bad, I thought, as the wind shrieked and the sky darkened — all that bounty would blow away to Oz. No jam. No smoothies. No promised delivery to the neighbors.
Or … I could run out there now — the wind would keep me cool as I harvested, and the rain would wash the berries as I went. Eureka!
Raspberries, as you know, grow in long spiky canes, and mine waved in the wind as I dove into the job. The bushes immediately snatched my shirt, my hair, my pants, my shirt in a different place, then my hair in another spot. Didn’t take me too long to get completely stuck. Daintily loosening the spikes one at a time would free me for an instant, then the wind would whip-stick it to me somewhere else.
What was the Right Way in this scenario? Forcefully ripping myself free would take hunks from my hair, my blouse and probably hurt my plant. I decided to opt for the Hard Way, and dove further in, frantically gathering as much as I could as the thunder rumbled. The deeper I went, the slack eased, and eventually freed me. Instead of counting myself lucky and seeking safety and shelter, all it took was spotting another cluster of ripe berries and the process started again.
There’s the easy way (pause), the right way … and the way where the berry-toned stains and scratches could be raspberry juice … or blood.