Rejected and Redeemed

Back in May, we let our housekeeper go. It was a weird set of circumstances that led us to that decision. But at the moment, it seemed so sensible.

Save money.

Let the kids help out more during the summer.

Save money.

Wrong on all accounts. Within 3 days I had turned into the demon mom from hell when I arrived home from work each day and quickly found things growing in my sink and commodes.

I put out the word among my mom friends:

Housekeeper needed. 911.

Within a few days, a friend had scheduled me an appointment for her housekeeper to come over and look at our house to see if she could ‘fit us into her schedule.’

Ahhh, little did I know how this works. I was so naive.

My soon to be house keeping savior showed up and I allowed her into our house, as is, things growing in the sink and all.

Within about 15 seconds, I realized something very interesting:

This was like a job interview. And we were quickly failing.

I was not interviewing her, she was interviewing us, in Spanish no less, with her sister who had come along with her.

I am sure in her mind, she was thinking something to the Spanish effect of, “oh, hell no,” because her face spoke volumes.

At the end of the reverse ‘interview,’ I asked her if she could start and she said to me in broken Spanish: “give me your number.”

Well, there ya go. She had basically just said to me, “don’t call me, I’ll call you.”

I was stunned.

Speechless.

Stayed in a dark room for days. Well, not really, but it sure seemed like that.

The sink and toilets continued to grow at about the same rate as the horns sprouting from my head each day as the house got messier and messier.

I really tried. The kids picked up well enough to keep me from giving them up for adoption.

But I knew we were in trouble. And I think they did, too.

Once again, put out the word that I needed help.

Only this time, I didn’t say 911.

I said, if someone doesn’t send me their housekeeper quick, you will all be visiting me at a location that has ‘Oaks’ or ‘Valley’ or in the name, because I will be checking into rehab.

Elizabeth to the rescue. I love Elizabeth. She knows a crisis when she sees one and is closer to God than the Pope.

I am sure Elizabeth had her church group laying hands on a photo of my house on Wednesday night.

And it worked!

Sure enough, she found a wonderful, marvelous saint of a lady from her church who agreed to come over and see if she could ‘fit us into her schedule.’

This time though, I was prepared. I knew the routine.

I had Chase cover the whole house in Fabuloso. (For those of you not familiar with Fabuloso, it’s a house keeping product that makes your house smell, well, fabulous, and is used by many housekeepers in our area.)

I’m thinking…if she smells Fabuloso, she’ll think the house is cleaned periodically instead of quarterly.

I went on the warpath before she arrived. I had Chase and Jordan (Tyler was smart enough to bail out on this one…) picking up everything that was not nailed down and put it in a closet.

And then I prayed she didn’t ask to see the closets.

And then we poured more Fabuloso.

She showed up for our interview.

Within seconds, I loved her.

We connected immediately.

She didn’t ask to see the closets (Elizabeth, if you read this, please thank God for me next Wednesday for that one!)

Within 15 minutes, we had a supply list, created a schedule and agreed upon a price (little did she know, I would have offered up one of my Ninos she kept calling ‘cute’ as she walked around, if that’s what it would have taken to get her to come back!)

She even agreed to start the next day (which also happened to be the day of the horrible swim meet and Jordan defaming Donald Duck.)

We arrived home from the swim meet to a house that smelled like Fabuloso that someone else had poured, and was oh, so clean and sparkly.

The horns in my head have diminished almost entirely.

And I owe Elizabeth big time.

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