A Tisket, A Tasket, I Bought a Laundry Basket

I've been doing the Mom thing for 19 plus years now, and I swear to you, I thought I'd seen it all. Sweet bubbly smiles, nasty body fluids, sticky valentines, muddy sneakers, the little time warp kids fall into as they go to sleep that turns them back into babies (I have a sneaking suspicion that this is an evolutionary survival tactic - we moms can forgive a lot when we see 'em transformed back into the babies we remember). I can't tell you how many tubes of chapstick I've found in my dryer (cleans up better than crayon, fyi), how many toilets I've plunged because some newbie potty user was very enthusiastic about wiping. Kids do lots of peculiar things, just to see if they can. Like my oldest son stuck his head through the slats on the back of a rocking chair. And got stuck. Same child tried to fly. He put some thought into it: got every fan in our house in one room, got a towel for a cape, turned on all the fans and did the Superman Liftoff. He then discovered the Law of Gravity. His younger brother got a Power Wheels truck for his birthday. I found him in the street in the predawn gloom, merrily Power Wheeling his way to the store.

I thought I'd seen everything.

But I'd never seen two children get into a fist fight over a clothes basket.

It was all my fault of course. I bought two new baskets so that I could put each child's neatly folded clean clothing in his or her own basket, for him or her to put away. A nice end-run around the part of laundry I despise - the redeployment. An organized system to deal with an awe-inspiring weekly heap of smelly socks, questionable undergarments and mystery stains. I have about 4 baskets in varying degrees of decay. I threw out the most decrepit, drove to Big Lots and purchased two rectangular white plastic baskets. Took them home feeling like I'd solved a major problem, like I could be nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. Tossed them down in the living room and went to turn on the dryer. And when I returned, I saw this: in one corner, weighing in at 42 lbs and standing 48 1/2" tall, Josephine the Spitting Queen. In the other corner, at just under 55" and tipping the scales at 70 lbs, the Austinator. I left a living room and came back to a WWF Smackdown. There was hitting and punching and kicking and yelling and name-calling. There were tears and snot, but no blood and guts. Pouts aplenty. Sulking with style. Deep sighs and whispered threats. All over a damn laundry basket!

I read this book once about sibling rivalry. It claimed that each child's personal mission was to claim the exclusive love of the parent, which sorts out to this: each kid wants to be the favorite. And the favorite gets the new laundry basket.

Forget visualizing world peace. Buy all you want at Big Lots for $1.99 a basket.