When DNA Gets Twisted
by Karen Williams | February 01, 2007 - Seminole Chronicle
I was sitting placidly at my computer, doing work and/or reading e-mail jokes, when teenage Emily (possibly not her real name) stomped into my room. "I'm going to lay down some ground rules," she bellowed.
"About what?" I asked. "And, by the way, aren't I the one who's supposed to say that to you?"
"Mom!" There was a pause after the "Mom," which told me that I'd better listen up or she'd ground me from my twice-weekly fun time with the washer and dryer. "I want you to stop cleaning my room!"
Not this again, I shuddered.
"And do you know why I want you to stop cleaning my room?" she demanded.
"Because you're doing a science experiment that involves cockroaches and bedbugs?"
"No! Because when you cleaned my room last week, you mislaid some important papers that I needed for school," Emily explained. "I searched everywhere for them and finally found that you'd put them in my clothes basket!"
"Well, it seemed logical. You never use it for clothes!"
"That doesn't matter," she retorted. "For several days, I was missing notes, folders, and even my negatives for photography class! If you want me to be successful, you've got to quit messing with my stuff!"
"Well, I don't know why you'd leave books and papers lying all over the floor and getting walked on. In my day, that would have gotten us booted out of class. Get it? 'Booted' out of class?" I grinned.
Icy stare.
What was wrong with this picture? Why wasn't Emily cleaning her own room? Why wasn't she compulsively neat like me? Why didn't she laugh at my jokes? Where on Earth was Dr. Phil when we needed him?
I was born neat and tidy, my mother said, though perhaps she wasn't remembering accurately. I refused to drool or dribble, and I potty-trained myself before she even had time to rush to the dime store and buy a potty. As a toddler, I could be taken to anyone's house and I would never mess with people's vases, figurines or snarling pets - I would merely sit quietly with my little hands in my little lap, looking angelic.
As a child, I organized my possessions with methodical precision. Play-Doh was arranged by color, games were stacked alphabetically, and my dolls were rotated on the shelf according to who had been played with last. I always returned items to their assigned spot in the closet, and my cousins recall how I browbeat them to help with the task.
Through a twisted anomaly of DNA, this "clean gene" was not passed on to my children, with son Smitty and daughter Emily being examples of extreme mutation. Tidiness to them means you can scoop the floor free of debris in 15 minutes when company's expected, and sanitation means the health inspector gave you one more week to clean up before bulldozing starts.
Trying to be open-minded and tolerant, I've never demanded that my kids clean their rooms. I've simply insisted they allow me to come in and do the job correctly, rendering their habitats as neat as Martha Stewart's cupboard and as hygienic as an operating room.
And now Emily says I can't do that anymore? Well, missy, you better put a big padlock on your door - one that my angelic little hands can't find a way to break.
Copyright 2007 - Karen Williams
