More Work for Mother

We bought this house eleven years ago. It had some stuff wrong with it, but a lot of things right--such as the price, location, the four-year-old air conditioning and heating systems, and the soaring cathedral ceilings in the living and dining rooms.

However, one of the wrong things is the white tile flooring in the kitchen and dining room. It has wavy edges and half-inch wide dark gray grout. Several years ago, I started staining the grout off-white, a many-stepped, tiresome chore I quickly abandoned.

But now along comes my daughter's wedding, and coincidentally, I found a fabulous grout cleaner. So I am taking up the chore again--and I like the results so much that this time, I will finish! It looks like a totally different floor. The grid look disappears completely, and it looks much less high-tech and casual. I will not lie, though. It's going to take me a while.

First, I spray this grout cleaner on the lines. It sits for a couple of minutes. Then I scrub, hard, with a brush and a toothbrush. Then I rinse, twice. Then it has to dry. At that point, I go over the grout lines with white grout paint. Once that dries somewhat, I go over it again, painstakingly with a little brush, with buff grout colorant. It has to dry at least twelve hours, then I scrub off the excess with a white scrubber. The blue or green ones are too abrasive.

After that, I have to wait a month before I can wash the floor. At that point, I will spray on another sealant because the tile has a lot of little scratches that hold dirt, and it will fill them up.

Sounds like fun, huh? But I swear, it looks like a new floor. And since my 23-year-old kitchen needs replacing, it will keep me going for a few years until we can afford that.

Concurrently, I am reading a book called "More Work for Mother," a treatise on how industrialization had a bigger influence on reducing traditionally male chores--for example, how the advent of coal-burning stoves made it unnecessary for men to chop and split wood--but made more work for women because, in this example, meal preparation became more complicated, and the stove needed a lot more care than an open hearth. Hmmm.

The Mirror Doesn't Lie

I have spent a great deal of my life worrying about my weight and my looks. I'm one of those people who would rather be hit by a truck than gain 30 pounds. I began dieting, with my mother's enthusiastic approval, when I was about 14. When I was 17, I went to the doctor for my pre-college physical, and I weighed 116 pounds. He told me not to gain any more, but of course at college, with the stress, I did. I ate a lot, and gained about 11 pounds.

In fact, my biggest regret is that during my college years, I allowed myself to obsess over my weight and my love life and did not enjoy the variety of experiences available on campus. I wish I'd taken more dance classes, and not pushed myself to get through early (I was only 21 and two months when I graduated). I felt unattractive and therefore unworthy of any young man's attention. Actually, I was only about 10 pounds overweight.

Well, I managed to get married a couple years after graduating, and lost weight (about 13 pounds) without even trying just after I got engaged. I remember, at about age 35, getting on the scale and being shocked that my weight had "ballooned" to 117 pounds--what I weighed four months after giving birth to my son! I didn't have a weight problem until my thyroid went south when I was 37.

I went to Weight Watchers at age 43 and lost 20 pounds, a few of which I gained back, then lost a couple of times.

Still, I was a food addict. I worried every day about my weight. I love chocolate and sweets--cookies are my favorite food. I love to bake, and then eat what I bake.

Then I got cancer in the spring of 2006. I was about six pounds over what I like to weigh when I was diagnosed. I went through surgery and radiation, and then took Tamoxifen for a couple of months. It made me so depressed I begged the doctor to let me stop. Well, I did. Then I began to eat.

I gained about 12 more pounds and I have not been able to lose it since. Now, it has become a real problem because my self-esteem has plummeted, and I have to get a dress for my daughter's wedding in July. I have never been this heavy for this long. I know it doesn't sound like much, but it's two sizes for me. (I am very small-boned.) Good thing I do Jazzercise three or four times a week, or I'd be a whale.

I can't figure out why I cannot seem to stop. I have lost weight before, and I feel a lot better when my clothes fit. I have had to replace nearly all my pants this past year. But it's hard to go into the stores and face the truth in the dressing-room mirror.

I have said that being overweight is like having a ball and chain around your ankle and the key in your hand, and being too afraid, or too lazy, to lean down and unlock it. I am not sure what eating is solving for me (maybe it's menopause!) but until I do figure it out, I have to basically take one day at a time--like those Overeaters Anonymous members do.