Cleaning Under Kids' Beds (or Land of the Lost)

The kids are officially on summer vacation. What better way to kick off the footloose and fancy free furlough than detonating... um, cleaning... their bedrooms. And the opening act of this purge party is the always entertaining "pull the bed out and behold the hidden, dust-kissed treasures that you've forgotten about, but can't bear to part with." Forget King Tut's tomb or the anticipation of cracking Al Capone's vault. Geraldo certainly wouldn't be disappointed in the treasure trove of Pokemon cards, odd Lego pieces, capless markers, dirty socks, and half-read books. Even the cats can't help but feel compelled to join the fun, walking among the new-found prizes, hoping to snatch up a rogue catnip mouse or super ball. For the kids, it's nearly like Christmas.

"I forgot about this Wolverine action figure!"

"That's what happened to that puzzle piece!"

"There's my math homework!"

This under-bed-clean-sweep undoubtedly takes hours because the child must spend satisfactory time pondering and playing with each newly discovered toy. It's expected that when we take the occasional progress-peek into the room, we will never catch the child in the act of cleaning. My favorite oft-used term from my son is "I was just gonna." But after many laborious hours (on the part of the parent, that is) of progress peeks and gentle (and not so gentle) nudges to drop toys into the "donate" bag, the darkened den is devoid of dusty knicknacks. Suddenly, games all have their pieces again, Pikachu joins his friends, and Spiderman is reunited with his head. Now, as for my plans to go through my closets? I was just gonna.