more laundry therapy

Shorts and underwear, towels and tshirts, a few napkins and socks and miscellaneous items from the top of the counter. Whites and darks and reds and whatever was in the pile all getting thrown in together. Today I just couldn't be bothered. I just want it all clean. Done. Over with. So I threw everything in haphazardly, picked a nuetralish temperature and hit 'go' on the washing machine.

My dryer is sitting on my porch. As my sister will tell you--we're half redneck.

I suppose it shouldn't surprise me when metaphors arise--as they often do--out of the stack of laundry in my baskets. I spend a great deal of my life doing laundry after all. Sorting, inspecting, scrubbing, washing, moving around, folding, putting away, repeat. How could metaphors not arise?

I think sometimes I come off as too deep. I think too deeply. Feel too deeply. Talk about things that others maybe find a little too close, a little too deep to share or talk about. I'm kind of messy sometimes and I don't shy away from messes and well, I think some people it bugs and others it makes uncomfortable and it leaves me holding back a lot of the time. Not wanting to cross a line I'm not very good at seeing. It's hard in the "making friends" place for me. Maybe not everyone is a struggle-through type? I'm cool with that. But every once in a while I wish I was different. That I didn't find a lesson in the school run, or grocery shop, or the pile of laundry.

Like today when a laundry metaphor smacked me in the face. I just wanted to throw it all in and push a button and have it done. "It" you know? I want "it" done. The messy pile of stuff.

We're doing a cleanse of sorts. The Whole30. It's 30 days of totally clean, paleo eating. No grains. No sugar. No dairy. Just clean protein, loads of yummy veggies, and lots of good fats. It's actually going really well. Several annoying everyday symptoms passing by the wayside. I'm too holistic to expect that cleaning out the toxins in my body isn't going to kick up toxins in my heart, mind and soul though. Or the hearts, minds, and souls of my compadres on this journey--the fellas.

I expected it would happen. A cleanse with several weeks off together. With a first major holiday in a new country. With a visit from family from far away. With homesick boys and heartrending loneliness and loads of new adventures and the culture shock of beginning to get comfortable with location but not yet with culture. It's bound to kick stuff up, and it has. Old, yucky toxic crap that has clearly been making me deeply sick and exhausted. Other less entrenched stuff that has become just a frustrating nuisance. All of it piling up a bit in a big smelly mess. And today, I just want to throw it all in together. Just toss it in, push a button, give it an hour or so, and hope it comes out clean.

Except just like the laundry if I do that some stuff will shrink that needs to stay big. Colors will bleed or fade and won't be as vibrant. Things will be ruined. Things won't get properly cleaned and later on it'll just make for more work and more mess. So I'm trying to be brave and even a tiny bit organized. I'm trying to pluck up the courage and gumption to sort it. Inspect it. Scrub at pre-treat and wash away the toxins, move things around a bit, then put away what needs to be kept and learned and gleaned from the process. Then repeat. And repeat. And repeat some more as long as necessary.