I found my daughter in the laundry room sorting through freshly washed clothes much like how a raccoon pilfers through trash looking for a tossed tasty morsel. The only difference between the two is Ella was looking for a clean bra. Surprisingly, I had no idea Ella has the same startle reflex as most wild animals and rodents. She jumped up from the laundry pile and scurried around me, holding her bra and her heart as if she had been mortally wounded.

I felt sorry for her and then for myself for not having the time or organizational skills to sort all this for her, but I try to remain positive. The bra almost made it into her dresser, sitting nearly empty just a couple rooms away and at least it’s clean. Good enough. It has not always been this way. I took a new job about 8 months ago, and there has a been a progressive down slide into what exists here in my household today. The state of my house reminds me how a dystopian novel reads… chaotic, hopeless, and apocalyptic. Unfortunately, I do not see any hero in, on or near the horizon coming to save me from the ever growing cascade of my list of to do’s.

When the weekend hits, I have a few moments of fleeting optimism. 48 hours seems like enough time. However, the realization of how things have gone a stray and having enough insight to understand that the amount of my shit exceeds the number of hours needed to make a dent. In spite of this I do my best. But as I often say, sometimes your best isn’t good enough. I might have this engraved on my headstone.

Balancing the responsibilities of being an adult, being a parent, and still wanting to have a little fun, means for me that my house might look like my hair when I first wake up in the morning. I might be faster to take a comb through my hair then to clean my house, but I have been accused of being a bit vain. I feel it is my right to still try to look pretty in a messy house.

As a recovering perfectionist, I am trying to embrace the concept of almost and good enough. In one, five or twenty years, I wonder how much of this will matter? I highly doubt on my deathbed I will mutter the words to Ella, “I’m sorry your bras didn’t always make it to your dresser.” Nonetheless, I do think, maybe too much, about lining up a person who can cull all those things I have collected that I don’t want Ella or others to find after my demise. I think this is a whole other can of worms that I might unpack on another day. Until then I will try to live happily ever after in my very imperfect world.