I Wannabe Claire Huxtable

If you have been reading my blog for a short while, then you know that I am a huge Cosby Show fan. Lately I have been thinking about the episodes where Cliff builds a room for Claire so she can have a space of her own.

I am writing this from my upstairs, unfinished bathroom. It has been like this for a year and a half. Why am I writing in the bathroom you are wondering? Because there is no where in this house to go. Let me set the scene for you.

In my kitchen where there is a rather nice peninsula for me to write at, I have a working teenage daughter. Said daughter wants to gallivant with friends tomorrow after school and get home sometime around her curfew. So we played lets make a deal and in exchange she has to clean the kitchen spotless because she has not cleaned it in oh, about three days. The fruit flies have settled in for the winter. Alas, even if she wasn't blaring her radio and banging pots and pans, I would not be able to sit at the peninsula anyway. Half of it is filled with dropped off junk mail and things that the children and the hubby find around the house that they don't know what to do with so they just leave it there for me to figure out. The other half of the peninsula has a fish tank full of dirty water and no fish. I believe the fish died about 2 months ago.

The dining room which has a huge table has a fourth grader working on homework even though his sister has not washed the table down from dinner. I wouldn't be able to work there anyway, too close to the kitchen, the blaring radio, and the cleaning teenager. The living room and the den which are connected to the dining room have a teenage boy and his teenage sister doing their homework. When they are not fighting with each other. Not too much work is getting done between the bickering and the sounds of the cleaning teenager, and the fourth grade brother who is trying to be the peacemaker. "Everyone just shut up!!!!"

So I travel upstairs. The girls' clothes room is an option, but well, it's the girls clothing room and it looks like it threw up girl's clothing everywhere. The girls' room has a sick 6 year old who is watching really obnoxious cartoons. And their room is a sty, and I would be distracted and aggravated. Some things are better left unseen.

On to the boys room. No human being should be allowed to enter. It's the boys room. They are not allowed to bring up drinks or food. But whenever we have a cup shortage, the first place I send the children to is the boys' room. There is also the other teenage boy watching The Office. Very loudly.

"But what about your own bedroom" you ask me, all innocent like. It is supposed to be my haven. I clean it, light candles, freshen it up. And then my husband comes home. Strips down to his scivvies, leaving socks and work uniform wherever they land. He plops down on the recliner with his laptop and the Blues Brothers movie, plays it loud, and farts like he just had a plate of beans for dinner. Yeah, that is a romantic picture, ain't it. (Allison, I am so sorry, I know I am scaring you away from marriage. Best you learn these things now dear.)

How can someone write under those conditions? How can a person hear herself think!

I want the room Cliff built Claire. It was soundproof. Yes it was. Can you imagine moms out there? Not to hear the children whining the moment you take two seconds for yourself. Oh, they will be out there doing it, but you won't hear it. Isn't that beautiful? I laugh like a giddy school girl just thinking about that. I know, sadistic right?

And she was going to decorate it so nice. She had a nice soft rug that had no stains on it from children spilling tropical punch kool-aid, or chocolate milk. And the beauty of that- it never would have stains because the children were not allowed. She could lock it when she left. No kids or farting husband allowed. If she had cinnamon scented candles going and nice smelling potpourri, it would smell soft and womanly. Not like old sausage and smelly socks.

I want that room. Because here I am, sitting on the bottom rung of the ladder my husband has had in this bathroom for the last six months writing on my blog. At least it is quiet. There is no toilet in here, and Lord knows no one under the age of 16 ever voluntarily bathes, so I am safe until someone needs to find some socks.(There is a sock drawer in the upstairs bathroom. Don't ask.)

At least a woman can dream. I know exactly the color I would want for my walls and rug, and where I would hang pictures.

I can almost hear the jazz music I would have playing in the background........