Saturday, October 6, 2012

Hug a janitor

Today, I cleaned our church.
It took me 7 hours.

This is not the first time I have done this.


Actually, I've been filling in for our cleaning lady whenever she needs me to for the past several years.

I got an iPod shuffle for Christmas, so this year, I've had something to listen to while I worked, but all those other years, I was left alone with my thoughts....

NOW, my thoughts have nice background music.

What does one think about while cleaning one's church?
Well, a lot of stuff. Like, why don't janitors get more recognition?
The first thing I think of when I think of a janitor is toilet scrubbing.


Which isn't as gross as it sounds.
Our cleaning lady gets this Clorox stuff you squirt in the bowl (which is fun) and she started buying this purple kind that smells like lavender fields.



Or at least, that's what it says on the bottle.
I've never actually smelled an entire field of lavender so I'll have to take their word for it.

Honestly, cleaning the guys' bathroom is a little stinky because of those pink things they put in the urinals.

What?
You don't know what I'm talking about because you've never been in a guys' restroom?
Count yourself blessed.

Nawww, it's not that bad.

I actually like cleaning the guys' restroom better that cleaning the girls'.
Why?
Because. The girls' restroom is never really dirty.
I mean, yeah, lots of people use it, so there's bacteria we can't see, and we need to keep everything sanitized so we don't kill off the congregation.

But there's never any DIRT.
 I don't know about you, but it's really boring cleaning something that doesn't look dirty. When I clean something I like to see the difference from before I came along.

When I sweep the floor in the girls' restroom, I don't actually see any difference in the appearance of the floor. I MIGHT see a little dust at the end.

When I sweep the guys' restroom, I actually get a pile of dirt and grass and maybe even a candy wrapper.

When I'm done mopping the girls' restroom, the water is still the same pristine orange (from the orange Lysol) as when I started.
 When I finish the guys', it's actually obtains a brownish tint!
So when I dump it out, I don't feel like I just wasted two and a half gallons of soapy water.

Oh, on a side note, remember whenever dumping out used cleaning water outside, to be facing down hill in order to avoid soggy shoes and socks with a lingering scent of oranges.

But really, the bathrooms only take up about 20% of the time I spend cleaning at the church. I clean a few windows and I wipe a few tables, but the majority of the work it vacuuming.

We have big honkin' heavy-duty vacuums and now we have ones that are self-propelled, but you should see the biceps I got from when they weren't.


And the boys wonder how I beat them arm-wrestling.
(That's a slight exaggeration. I haven't arm-wrestled any boys in quite a while, and when I beat them was when I was still as big as them. I was 11.)
(Let's forget I even mentioned that at all.)

The problem with the self propelled vacuums (we have two) is that I can't decide which is worse: the one that doesn't work very well or the one that works TOO well.
The one that doesn't work is heavy, but controllable.
The one that works too well gives you the dog leash effect. And that can be hard on the toes on the return stroke.

Anyway, it's really not a bad way to earn some money, and I get to browse the church fridge for left-over doughnuts to eat with lunch.
Apple fritters are my favorite doughnut EVER.
If you ever need to get rid of some apple fritters, SEND THEM MY WAY.

By the way, there were no fritters today. But there was a lovely little blueberry-covered AND -filled doughnut that met my needs quite well.

Anyway, I got to rambling, but the point of this post was to raise some awareness about what janitors go through to promote appreciation.
Have you hugged a janitor today?


Be Thankful, Sarah

PS. The reason I filled in today for our cleaning lady is because she's at the hospital.
With her daughter.
Who is gonna have a baby any time now!
Pray it goes well!

2 comments:

Chasity S. said...

I awarded you! (It's the second award)
http://ahomebeyondtheriver.blogspot.com/2012/10/three-awards.html

Tyler Perkins said...

There are actually lots of decent jobs in our society, and we found them to be respectable and decent. However, some think that other jobs are somewhat low profile, especially the janitors. For me, janitors should be respected for they're doing a tough job – cleaning surroundings, facilities, and even messy bathrooms. In fact, janitors have an honorable job, because without them, who would do all the chores that we don't want to mess up with?