THERE ARE SOME THINGS I HATE TO DO THAT MUST BE DONE

I love cooking and baking for family and friends, but what I hate doing is the clean up that follows the preparation for and cooking of the meal or baking of the cake (or pie, or cobbler, or cookies, etc).

When I lived in Silver Spring Maryland, I had a friend who always needed to bring in treats for someone’s birthday. Sometimes it was just her turn to bring in a treat, and other times she just wanted something sweet to eat, and I’d bake something since she could barely boil water correctly. Anyway, when she was in the kitchen talking to me and watching what I was doing, what amazed me initially, was when I was done sifting the flour, making the batter and greasing and flouring the cake pan for example, I would open the oven door to put the cake pan in, and I would stand up and turn around to find that the kitchen counter had been wiped clean and every thing from the flour, butter, eggs, vanilla flavoring, and other left over ingredients has been put in containers and put back in their proper places either in the refrigerator or the cabinets. The second time I had prepared a cake for baking, I watched as she had come behind me with towel to wipe up sugar and flour that spilled as I was measuring up ingredients, and had disposed of egg shells, and she had put back each leftover ingredient just as I was done using them. All that needed to be washed was the mixing bowl and my mixing spoon. I liked that she had done that.

Anyway, it always reminded me of my college days; I was that rare college student that opened my books the first evening after each class. While my friends were out partying I was in the library, studying each chapter before I even had to do so. I did this because I didn’t want to wait until the last minute to read and cram the contents of entire book in my brain over night. I had lots of friends that gave me a hard time during each quarter for studying too much, but I was aware of and was always prepared, for surprise tests that always angered my friends and classmates. I was always prepared for mid terms and final exams because I had been studying all quarter and didn’t have to read a 500 page book overnight.

Sometimes we let things fester.

Life can get messy if we’re not careful, and knowing this, if we take care of business along the way, it’ll be easier to take care of if we don’t let it pile up. I'm still not there, but I try to remember that if I ignore it today, I might get bigger tomorrow  and bigger the day after tomorrow, and so on-