The Red Light

I'm a hands and knees, scrub-brush toting, toothbrush/toothpick tooling, cleaner. I'm not the greatest housekeeper, but when I get going it's obsessive. With two dogs, a cat, and a pair of toddlers the house's condition all too often depresses me and there never seems to be enough time to keep up. That's life.

My mother will attest I was not always this way. As a youth I could ignore any and all debris scattered around our home. My method was the long step. I didn't change much in my twenties as my girlfriend at the time would testify (tell 'em RC). Once I was living on my own, however, something changed. It wasn't just that I had no one else to clean up after me. I just got tired of looking at my own crud. Tidy was my watchword. It still is. So I clean now. It's part of my domestic reponsibilities. I don't like doing it, but I can't stand it not being done.

I try to get a fast run in every day; the old pick up and wipe up. A run of the vacuum a couple of times a week; a serious cleaning every two weeks and the ominous deep clean every couple of months. It isn't enough but it has to do.

When I got pneumonia a while back it preceeded the Boy's birthday party. We had guests coming and the house was a mess. Time and health didn't allow for a thorough cleaning so my wife decided to hire a cleaning service - professionals. When they left I went through the house and cleaned up their mess. So many things were missed - so many things done poorly - we might as well have never called them. And so it goes.

Our vacuum gets a workout sucking up all manner of hair, leaf litter, crushed pretzels and dried elbows of Mac & Cheese. It holds its own throughout, sucking its bags full on a regular basis. God bless Kenmore. There is a light on the vacuum. It is activated by an adjustable sensor that measures the amount of dirt intake. If there are still particulates going in, the light remains red. Once clean, the light changes to green. I keep the sensor on the most sensitive setting. I want all that dirt. It tends to make vacuuming a time-consuming process. The light takes forever to go off. I move the machine back and forth over one spot, my eyes focused on that red light. Eventually, it begins to flicker teasingly: red to green to red - another bit of filth sucked inside and then clear and then, wait, more dirt. When it finally sustains its green I move six inches to the right or left and repeat the process.

The red light controls my life. I talk to it. Curse it. Plead with it. I need it and hate it. I am not done until it says I'm done. I could, of course, just adjust the sensor, but then I would be missing dirt and I can't have that. I am a slave to my vacuum.

The theme of humans enslaved by their machines is an old one in fiction. It always involves our devices becoming smarter than their makers. It's much simpler than that. There aren't Cylons; just Kenmores. The red light is our future.