Fighting Entropy

I suppose that most homemakers/wives/mothers are oblivious to the fact that they actually spend most of their time in the impossible task of trying to counteract the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Things tend to randomness and disorder, and those of us who try to keep a household running smoothly spend a huge amount of time trying to bring order back into the chaos.

I thought about this yesterday as I attempted to clean the basement. I used the shop vac to rid the rafters of the spider webs and dead bugs....but I know they will come back. I swept the dust and debris off the floor, but that too will be back. I gathered a large pile of "stuff" for the dumpster, but my husband will collect more. I cleaned the ash bin under the wood furnace, including the pile in front of the furnace which had spilled out of the bin, but as cold weather comes, more wood will be burned and more ashes will be created.

Of course, mothers of toddlers have an even larger task. No one can leave behind a random trail of toys quite the way a toddler can. The child is learning and exploring, but after a couple of hours of this important play, just stand back and look at the room. There is no pattern discernible in the arrangement of books, blocks, stuffed animals, toy cars, pots and pans from the kitchen cupboards and sundry other items.

I guess not everyone feels this compulsion to try to introduce order where there is none. You would think someone bright enough to have taken a physics course would be less inclined. But, orderliness does bring comfort to some of us, and we are willing to expend a lot of energy trying to bring it about. When I put something in the freezer in the basement today, I enjoyed the fact that the place actually looked cleaner.

If only it could stay that way, or perhaps, clean itself up.

Oh, wretched entropy.