All Ye Who Enter Domesticity Beware--phebe's five finger exercise

Linda lets me into the house, helping me with the stack of belated Christmas presents which I had hastily wrapped just previous to arriving. While I take off my shoes, Linda walks back to the dining room table where Scott sits eating BBQ chicken pizza out of the box and seats herself. Christmas cards and photo cards adorned with neatly dressed children and holiday greetings are pinned evenly to a ribbon hanging from the side door. A dark stained maple bookshelf filled with professional portraits of the family taken at JC Penney and the taupe microsuede couch crowd the path to the table. As I walk towards them, Anne, one year old and sitting in her high chair, stares at me, eyes big and brown, while baby Samuel lies in his stroller facing Scott and Linda. Behind them, the kitchen remodeling project continues. There are planks of wood and a table saw on the floor. A plastic tarp covers the wall in the back. The table is crowded with a Sesame Street coloring book, plates, broccoli in a plastic container, the cardboard pizza box, and at the end, against the wall, a shelf dominated by a leaning tower of Tupperware threatening to fall over. “We’re still living in a war zone,” Scott says unapologetically. I lean in to say hi to 3 month old Samuel, grabbing his little toe and wiggling it. “Hi, baby,” I say and as he smiles back at me, Linda, trying to sound casual, asks, “Would you mind washing your hands?”