PRESSED

by DORETTE ROTA JACKSON PRHPRESSEDPRESSED By Dorette Rota Jackson sweep your Stress Away

ife really is like a box of

Lchocolates, Forrest. You never know what you’re gonna’ get. If I could pick, I’d choose toffee. Dawn is more of a peanut butter girl. Which brings me to this issue’s topic – stress-eating.

It’s that thing you do when the wheels in your head spin faster than your good judgement. While you’re trying to process the dilemma of the day, you spy a piece of week-old spice cake on the kitchen counter. You vaguely remember it tasting like cardboard seven days ago. Your common sense tells you to toss it into the Hefty-lined can, but your wheels ask, why not? You stuff it into your mouth on your way out the door.

With the holidays coming, our senses can take a leave of absence. Not only when it comes to food, but when it comes to everything! Like sparkle and shine. As with the beads, bangles and bows of the season. And the surfaces in your home. Spit shined to a glistening finish when you finally shift attention from the Milky Ways of Halloween to the cleaning supplies under your sink.

Dawn’s cleaning supply of choice is the hardwood floor steamer. Followed by the hardwood floor shiner. And the hardwood floor sealer. She says floors absorb negative energy from our shoes. “All day long, we’re tracking energy through the house. All the places we’ve been during the day. All the people who’ve walked on those pavements. That’s a lot of emotion on these floors,” she flaps as she walks around the house blowing steam from her machine.

I shimmy over to the freezer in search of the Milky Way I hid there the day before. Gone! Whose negative footsteps snatched the chocolate bar I hid under the frozen peas? Who would suspect the peas? I mumble out loud.

‘I want to get these floors in shape for the holidays,’ she’s still talking, as I dig deep behind the Shoepeg and the Eggos. ‘If you’re looking for the Milky Way, I ate it,’ she says when she sees me stressing in the freezer. ‘I ate the Reese’s Cup and the Milk Duds, too.’ No! Not the Milk Duds! I huff to myself. Total invasion of privacy. There are rules! If you didn’t hide it there, you don’t eat it. Basic social etiquette.

Dawn’s cleaning binge started during summer vacation, when she Edward-Scissorhanded my mother’s hydrangeas at the shore house. The overgrowth of trees and shrubs was out of control after several rainy summer weeks. By the time we finally got there, it looked like Gene London’s Quigley Mansion. Dawn decided to tackle the job to give the landscaper a jump start. She plopped a lawn hat on her head like Nights in Rodanthe and grabbed a pair of white rubber gardening clogs, a scissor and gloves and went to work on the Rose of Sharon and the Chinese

Rose bushes. I never saw anyone clip so fast. ‘You need sheers, not scissors,’ I holler over. And spray Off on your arms! Says here on Google to wear loose white clothing so you can see ticks if they get on you.’ She was annoyed as I rattled off more gardening tips from my handy dandy app.

‘You know what you need,’ she glared into my eyes. ‘How ‘bout you grab a broom and start sweeping all this negativity away.’

I figured I’d better grab the broom and partake in this manic gardening spree. Before long, the bushes were as manicured as the Disney shrubs in Orlando. I think one was in the shape of Tinkerbell!

As we teeter on the threshold of a New Year, I think Dawn is right. Now may be a good time to buff those floors.

And hide a few Hersheys in your freezer.

Happy Holidays. Be kind to one another. PRH