“Man, this is really bad,” Pumpkin said, holding a cleaning rag and a spray bottle of bathroom cleaner. He was standing in the hallway alternately looking into his bathroom and then at me and then back again. I watched him from my chair in the living room. I don’t recall seeing this much amazement shining in his eyes in a very long time, if ever.
“No shit, I’ve been telling you to clean your bathroom for weeks,” I said.
“It’s like, I woke up this morning and just really saw it, ya know? It was bad,” he said, looking back into the bathroom. I think the magic mushrooms he ate for breakfast helped “high def” his vision.
“I think your shirt is on inside out,” I said.
“Yeah, I am pretty sure it is,” he said, looking down at his shirt before going back into the bathroom to continue cleaning.
He stayed in there for another half hour. I could hear him drop the shower curtain tension rod at least six times. Since he didn’t yelp in pain, I figured I would just let it go. He came back into the hallway with a big smile on his face.
“Mom, come see my bathroom!”
I got up and walked over to him. I looked into the bathroom timidly, not sure of what I would find. It looked beautiful, except the tension rod with the shower curtain on it was across the middle of the shower doorway instead of at the top.
“Son, don’t ya think the shower curtain is a little low?”
“Yeah, the shower curtain is way long,” he said, walking over to the stall. He lifted the curtain up to show me how much was lying across the shower floor. “I think I better cut it. Why the fuck did I buy a camouflage shower curtain?”
“I’m not really sure. But, I am sure you need to put the shower curtain rod up higher.”
“No, that’s kinda where it landed, where it wants to be.”
I walked over to the shower and waved my hand in the opening between the curtain and the top of the shower saying, “If you don’t raise the curtain water will come out onto the floor through this open space.”
“Right, right, yeah, ok, for sure. I will fix that later,” he said, staring into the space he created. He took another nibble of pharmaceutical fungi. “Well, I gots lots to do. Some in the house, some out of the house.”
“I think you should just focus on the stuff in the house today. I think tomorrow would be a better out of the house day.”
I sat down in the living room again. His doors of perception were swinging open all right. I remember when I shroomed last. It came on while I was sorting laundry. An hour into the task I realized I had about five piles sorted—not just the usual darks, colors and whites. I was just tossing the clothes and watching the trails. What is it about shroomin’ and cleaning with our DNA? Then, the horrible sound of my vacuum cleaner sucking up something bad shook me from my memory.
“Bring it here so I can fix it,” I yelled to Pumpkin. He’d moved on to cleaning his bedroom.
“I don’t think fixing it is an option.”
“What the hell did you suck up?”
“The blind.”
“Seriously? Pick everything up off the floor before you vacuum!” His blind is often on the floor because he tends to come into the house through his bedroom window instead of the door.
“It was on the window,” he said, bringing the sweeper out with slates of the blind sticking out of it at various angles.
“How? How did this happen? Your window is above your bed for fucks sake!”
“Yeah, I got to go to the math lab,” he said, setting the sweeper down.
“It’s Sunday. The lab isn’t open. I thought we were going to focus on the things you need to do in the house today. Outside is not a good idea. Going to school is certainly not a good idea.”
“Right, I will be back,” he said, heading out the door.
“Your shirt is still inside out,” I yelled after him.
“That’s just where it landed.”