Women's Unending War With Dust

I always watch with bemusement the lengths some women go in order to combat dust and dirt so as to fit in with their peers.

Women's Unending War With Dust

Early in the morning, as soon as their children go to school, these housewives take to their brooms and scrubbing brushes and floor polish. Their quest is to make their floors as shiny as they can. They will toil and scrub and rub and clean until the floors are like mirrors. Only then are they happy and can then proceed to do other household chores I am not in any way belittling the wonderful work they do but just cannot reconcile their reasons for doing what they do.Half the time this is done because they don’t want the Mother of so and so to find their house dirty.So the reason is not really cleanliness but the need to conform or the fear of failing to conform ;then being turned into the laughingstock of the neighborhood.I have always maintained that even grownups suffer from peer pressure because this is definitely a form of peer pressure. Woe betide  the young ones should they come back from school and then absentmindedly wander into the house wearing their shoes. The mother will shout at the top of their voices for the offending shoes to be removed lest the wearer has his/her back tanned.The shoes are supposed to be removed and left outside the door or held and taken to the place where they are normally placed.

Homes which are supposed to be enjoyed by all who live in them are turned into no go areas for the young ones, they only get some respite when the father comes back from work ;if he is lucky enough to be formally employed. More often than not nowadays, he would be coming from a weird case of cat and mouse with the Riot Police for a space on the city streets. As vending has now become the biggest “employer” in the country. If however the father is also a serial shouter then the young kids do not have anywhere to seek refuge.These places of human habitat are turned into showrooms for the mothers friends to admire and coo over.In the process these ladies turn the floor polish vendors into fully employed individuals as they are assured of a constant stream of customers who buy their ware.

Surely if one cleans the house in the morning and the children then come and mess it up ,it should be alright.The well being of the family should weigh much more than the mother’s need for reassurance from her friends and extended family.