Chore Parties, becasue Obviously

 

My husband and I have a joke about basically being the last person in the world to find out about something. Specifically, Bruno Mars had been around a while, but I didn’t know that when I started to enjoy one of his catchy tunes. So now when one of us is late to the knowing something party we say “hey guys, Bruno Mars?”

My Bruno Mars of the moment is what I’m calling Chore Parties. Over the last year or so I’ve taken on the new role of stay-at-home mom with three littles and worked through some self-reliance issues. I have many friends who have gone through or are going through the same thing in part or parcel. I also have a friend who took her own life in September after suffering from postpartum depression. I’m not in any way minimizing the complexities of that sickness or saying “jeez, she should have just told someone!” but I’m on this campaign now to get everyone better able to articulate when they’re not ok.

Mom’s groups, play dates, just getting coffee or meeting up to exercise or hike is all fantastic and necessary; but there’s still a moment when you get home and still have all the everything to do. The house looks like a tornadoe is still actively occurring inside, sink might be full of dishes, you’re supposed to start dinner and all the kids are screaming or needing to be read to RIGHT NOW! Sure the time is always there, it’s just how we organize it. But sometimes it’s really hard to figure out the correct order of prioritization when you both need your cup filled by community and the family has to eat.

This doesn’t just apply to stay at home parents- shoot probably even more so for single parents, working parents or even those without kids but who still have all the things and seemingly no time to do it and by default less built in people to help.

Enter chore parties. Simply put a number of people go to one person’s house and help with whatever chore just can’t be gotten to or said person really hates. Maybe you can never get the laundry done, folded and put away all in the same day [or week]. Maybe you’re not sure the last time you vacuumed or mopped, or you just can’t get up the gumption to clean the bathrooms, or the yard has gone feral and you might disappear into the weeds if you venture out there alone. So everyone goes to this person’s house and helps with that task while you talk, shoot the breeze, help watch kids, build community, etc.

I say this is what my husband and I dub a Bruno Mars moment because cultures the world over and women down the ages knew this- we’re not supposed to do it alone and we can’t. Think of Amish barn raisings, women sitting around quilting or stuffing feather mattresses, washing clothes at the river as one of my friends likes to harken back to. Socializing and social fabric building happened in the midst of work, it’s the everyday stuff of life.

Maybe it’s the current paradox of being so connected and yet still so isolated. I saw a headline recently saying single people are having a harder go in this inflation than married people; and I’d just like to extrapolate out that single nuclear family units trying to do everything solo are also having a harder time than those more used to living multi-generationally or just in closer proximity to others and sharing the burdens.

Speaking of current inflation, paying someone to come clean is probably not in budget for many people right now, and I argue that in a lot of cases it probably shouldn’t be. I’m not knocking the practice entirely or chastising those who provide home cleaning services for currency but when we literally pay for our inconveniences to be handled or make life neat and transactional it’s harder to get close to people or help and be helped if that makes sense. If a favor is done we might be mentally keeping score whether we know it or not instead of just knowing that we help each other in different ways at different times and that’s called being human. You can’t help but be closer to someone once he or she has scrubbed your toilet or folded your underwear!

I also saw an article about a women on Youtube whose house is a total disaster (I think she’s also a stay at home mom) but then she slowly starts to clean up in the videos and this is apparently very edifying to people.  You guys! Step away from the computer! (I realize the irony as you’re probably reading this on a computer or mobile device). Go to a friend’s house and actually help him or her clean!

The internet is a double edged sword because we can be connected to so many more people near and far and that’s great, but also connected in a superficial way, most often just sharing the fantastic stuff. I remember when I studied in Prague we took a quick language and culture crash-course and they told us that the greeting ‘how are you,’ most of the time followed by a quick ‘good’ is not as common as in the United States. If you ask a Czech lady how she is she’ll unload all the crap going on in her life right now. So on all the various social networks we can say we’re just great, and leave it at that. I think in part that has made it harder for us to tell people when we’re really not great.

If we feel like or are a mess – both emotionally and literally in our spaces like home, it’s really hard to invite someone in to see all that chaos. We don’t want to be a burden, we don’t want to be embarrassed. We’re supposed to do it all, and well enough to post curated pictures of it on Insta and Facebook or Youtube. If we need something we don’t necessarily want to inconvenience others so we use handy services like Prime or Instacart to quickly and efficiently get things delivered to our door. But when the proverbial cup of sugar easily lands on our doorstep we’re still alone and missed that chance to banter with a neighbor.

So- once again my theory is we need to get better and taking down the curtain or barrier to others especially in regards to what is hard for us. It’s a symbiotic relationship because it’s as good for us to help others as it is to be helped. When you’re focusing your energies outward towards someone else you aren’t as caved in on yourself and all your travails.

This does happen - A friend did some ironing for one of my sister-in-laws after she had a baby. My sister -in-law does not particularly like this chore, so felt bad this woman offered to do it but turns out this friend actually loves to iron and also said “it blesses me to bless you.” While another friend was very pregnant with her 2^nd and had a busy toddler running around one of her friends came over and told her to take a nap while she (the friend) cleaned the bathroom and one of her daughters played with the smaller child. It was a huge gift to my friend. I have been privileged to be on the giving and getting end of many a meal train especially after a new baby and I love this way of taking care of people. I’m just suggesting we all get in the habit of helping and asking for help in the “ordinary time” so to speak, not just the big mile stones or life changes.

So, hey guys, chore parties?! Though I’m totally willing to accept that once again I’ve been living under a rock.