Thanks, Kenmore

The California Wilsons are behind. Mostly because we haven't lived in California for four or five months now. We went TDY to Texas for a few months and inhabited a teeny tiny apartment. Close quarters are fun because they are easy to clean, but that's one of the few benefits of living temporarily in a tiny apartment without one's belongings or room to turn around. Happily, we have completed that phase and moved on to Georgia. We are renting a beautiful little three-bedroom house. Little, that is, until it's time to vacuum. We moved in about a month ago, bought our vacuum about a week ago, and I finally put it on my checklist to get it out of the box and USE it today.

Taking care of Damien, Kyle, the house and now a calling and a full time job means that I need checklists for the first time in my adult life, just to keep track of things and make sure I don't forget to get my tasks done. Actually writing it down has made me realize, however, that I've always made mental checklists, separating the "need to dos" from the "want to dos" for the sake of prioritization. Today as I was vacuuming (one of my "need to dos" for the day) I realized some things about myself. My new Kenmore vacuum is smarter than me, apparently.

Let me tell you about this vacuum. It has a feature called "inteliClean" composed of four lights of varying shades: red fades to dark orange, to yellow, to green. As you vacuum, the power of the vacuum automatically adjusts based on the level of dirt in the carpet- you know the floor is clean when the light turns green. It sounds simple enough. Honestly it's sneaky and divisive. Kenmore must have known how obsessive I am about such things, and that I would be absolutely unable to tear myself from the vacuum until every spot of carpet in my home merits a green light. Tricksters.

Anyway, as I was vacuuming, I realized that I wish I had inteliClean for every aspect of my life. How much better would my performance be at my job, as a wife, as a mother, as a ward music chairman, as a homemaker, if I constantly had a blinking notification of the thoroughness of my effort hovering over my head? I think I get too caught up in getting the things on my list checked off. I do things adequately and efficiently, but I think I miss out on the satisfaction of living thoroughly. I could vacuum my entire house in 15 minutes if I could ignore the lights, and check the task off my list for the day so I could move on to things I like more. The funny thing is, when I spent the time it took to make my inteliClean happy, I actually enjoyed vacuuming. I got a little thrill out of making the light change colors.

Today is more than halfway over, and I spent a lot of it working and cleaning. I have probably missed opportunities to excel, to exert a complete effort, to be not just good enough, but as good as I can be. I've checked a lot of tasks off my list, but I think a lot of my "need to dos" are going to change into "need to do betters." Silly vacuum, showing me how to live my life. I'm going to install a mental inteliClean. Tomorrow I will do my best to vacuum until the light turns green.