When moms get to laugh

I probably don't laugh as often as I should, but when I laugh because of how ironic a situation is it's even better.

I felt probably about the same way my mom did when I used to leave all of my clothes on my bedroom floor, as a teenager; clean or dirty.  Then, when I got my own house I turned into this OCD, crazy clean fool.  Well, today I witnessed it.  I'm always getting onto the kids....sometimes maybe more than I should, about getting into my car or coming in the house filthy or what I deem dirty.

Last night we bought Cole his first car.  Nothing special, just a 9 year old Grand Prix, but it only had 102,000 miles, sounded good and was beyond what I consider gross and dirty.  And I broke my rule of not buying from a smoker, but it was a decent deal; barring the car will run for awhile with no major issues.  Today since I was washing and waxing my car for the year Cole decided to pull his up and clean his; after he got his turkey for the day (it's youth turkey season).  I had to laugh as he was trying to vacuum it out and Chase decided to help and then I heard it.  Cole told Chase not to get in his car with his shoes like that and then made him take his socks off because they were too dirty as well.  Then he took his own off to clean it.  I will not tell him how funny this was for a very long time for fear he'll stop, but it was really funny!  I told Brian and he just busted out laughing.  Our slob kid might actually take care of his car.  Precisely why I was pretty pushy about Cole being totally satisfied with what we ended up buying.

So after about 3 hours of cleaning and Brian and I joining in the effort it's clean.  There was nicotine stains all over every knob and dial in the control panel.  Cigarette butts in the ash tray and ashes everywhere.  No burn holes, oddly enough.  There were soda and/or coffee stains all over the floor and it was just dirty.  A dirty I hope I never have to clean again.  We even employed a toothbrush to clean out the nasty crevices that contained what looked like soda and tobacco remnants.  We scrubbed with soap and water to get all the vinyl parts cleaned.  Then Cole put protectant and shine on the whole thing.  We scrubbed the carpet after spraying it with cleaner and brushed off the ceiling, yes the ceiling.  We vacuumed every inch of it.  It now looks pretty sharp and doesn't smell near as bad anymore.  It will air out over time.

Cole did realize how gross smoking is.  He noted the guys apartment and the yellow, stained walls.  And Cole realized he didn't want to end up like that poor guy.  I'm hoping this experience was really good for him.  Sheltered lives can be good, but sometimes they need to get out of their element to see how others live and realize what they're thankful for and might want in life.  He's pretty excited about his car and I'm glad to see it, because it's not like we can afford another one like this if he doesn't take good care of it.