Courtesy flush

This morning holds an adventure that perfectly illustrates we are indeed homeowners. We have had our house for about two years. In that time we have done a few improvements here and there. We recently replaced our front door, or should I say, "the smile to our home". That is what the guy at Lowe's called it. You could tell it pained him to do so. He had sat in the employee break room during orientation a few months ago while a regional manager introduced him to the magical world of millwork. He roboted the line out and pushed some glossy brochures across the counter.

I gazed at pages of majestic entryways, enormous Craftsman style oak doors embellished with wrought iron fixtures and enhancements. You just knew that you'd push them open to find a golden retriever bounding towards you driven by the smell of freshly baked banana bread. Ambient temperature flowed out from this portal to heaven. "Come in please, leave your shoes in the basket my great-great grandmother wove by candlelight. We are over here in the library conjugating verbs with the children." My realistic mind knew I had a early 60's ranch and to place a door like that upon it would be sad and douchey. We got a nice simple mahogany set that grins at me with sassy confidence each time we pull into the driveway. My hand-woven shoe basket is a rubber boot tray from Target.

We will be heading back to Lowe's today to purchase a toilet. A painful $400 reminder that yes you own a home and you have to replace really boring shit prior to buying the bath towels you have been eyeing. Our toilet constantly clogs, and it clogs mostly after the children use it. Do I produce offspring that create larger than average feces? At least 4 times a month I hear a "MOM!" coming from behind the closed door. That cry used to mean that I would go into the bathroom to find whoever was in there bent over at the waist waiting for me to come and wipe their ass. Oh, how I miss those days. Now they can wipe themselves but they are turning my tile floor into a swamp of fecal soup. There aren't enough anti-bacterial products in this world that are going to help me emerge from these occurrences without counselling. I had to throw out a perfectly good bathmat the other day because I was too horrified to simply throw the sodden mess into a hot water wash.

I reason with the children. Tell them to flush before wiping, wipe and flush again. I quiz them on the amount of toilet paper they use and I sound insane. I can recall growing up with two kids that told me their parents only let them use 2 squares of toilet paper for peeing, and three for pooping. I never wanted to touch their hands. You cannot emerge from the bathroom with those wacked-out restrictions and not bring evidence of your journey. I hate getting angry at my kids for something that they may have absolutely no control over. It's just an old inefficient toilet and it needs to go. They may have larger than average bowel movements but I just don't want to know anymore about it. That is between them and their anus. So today we will go Lowe's to explore the thrill of what the modern toilet offers. Beat that for a fun Saturday.