I have a mixture of bare floors and large area rugs. And a vacuum I’ve had for years. And it seemed to work just fine.
Did I mention I also have two dogs? Two large dogs? A black lab. A sable collie. And an old vacuum. Yesterday I woke with the thought, “You need to replace that vacuum.”
It’s no fun spending money on vacuum cleaners. Let’s face it. They’re noisy. The good ones are heavy. There’s nothing pretty about them.
When I wake up with a thought, I usually consider it for about the first hour I’m awake and if nothing seems dangerous or demonic or even deadly, for that matter, I usually run with it. This vacuum cleaner thought seemed pretty safe. What could it hurt to go look?
My favorite store for all things with a cord is Ollie’s Bargain Outlet. Most of the time that’s the only place I need to look. Ollie’s is a plethora of things that are in the previous generation packaging, maybe a bit “dated”, but a great deal.
They buy out bankruptcies, and last year’s products and Bibles and crackers and bed linens. Children’s books and kitchen gadgets. (Who knew there was a thing called a microwave pressure cooker before Ollie’s came to town?)
Ollie’s inventory is constantly changing. Sometimes the only thing I buy in there is bird food, but every trip is an adventure.
Off to Ollie’s I went. Voila! Among other corded cleaning machines, I found a remanufactured vacuum at a bottom dollar price with a six month warranty. It’s a well known brand, so there was no risk.
That was before I realized the risk to my ego. To my pride. To my identity as a homemaker.
I got that monstrous piece of noisy equipment home and attached the things that needed attached. I plugged it in. It’s a model that has the clear filters and no bags, so it’s easy to see what the machine is doing. That is a new experience!
I pushed the red button. It started making noise as I pushed it along thinking, “Wow, enough of this and my bat wings might actually firm up.” I kind of thought I was wasting my time because I couldn’t see visible hair or dirt when I started.
Then…I looked at the front of that machine, into that clear canister that collects the stuff it picks up. I could feel my mouth hang open. I knew I was seeing things. Was there really that much dirt that I couldn’t see in those rugs? Was that hair hidden in those mini-carpets?
I was blushing. In my own home, alone. I looked at that ground-in dirt that no one could see as they walked past or across those rugs. Shame filled my thoughts. I had failed as a homemaker. I needed to turn in my Martha Stewart membership card.
Today it hit me. Hard. This was success. I learned something. Going down the wrong path with the wrong assumptions allowed this to happen. Thinking that cheap, decade old lightweight vacuum was performing well was incorrect. I had become quite casual about the rugs. If I didn’t see anything on it with a cursory glance, it must be good.
I should have been more diligent about protecting the rug fibers.
As I began to write this, something else crossed my mind. What would I find if I honestly put some “heavy equipment” (the Word) on my spiritual areas? Would I find some old ground-in “dirt”, the cast offs of a decade of not being diligent in my thought life, my prayer life, my relationship with my God? Have I protected my mind from the casualness of freedom in Christ?
I’d sure like to say “no”, but I think I need to check my canister.
For His Glory 