Is someone going to clean that up?

 Yesterday got off to an inauspicious start. Note that accidents happen, but many can be avoided. 

For example, pancake batter. I thought what was in the fridge was flour to be used up. I promised younger that we would make pancakes, and as we assembled ingredients, the aforementioned flour came out.

As G was mixing, he said "Mom? What are these black spots?"

I was busy cleaning up the overflowing toilet by the mudroom, so a little distracted, cursing the clogger for not putting our handy DO NOT USE sign up as a warning for hazardous waste dissemination. "Probably nothing," I called back while I mopped up the mess.  I washed my hands and headed back over, where G was wrinkling his nose in puzzlement.  He poured out some batter and readied the chocolate chips. I tasted the batter, then hastily scooped up what he laid down. 

Because the flour was batter coating for meat.  Want some garlic with your chips?

The whole time I'm fulminating, younger is reminding me "Worse things happen in a day, mom."

My mantra. Being thrown at me by my younger. 

And I thought he didn't listen.

I toss the mess out; we clean up and start over. 

When he is settled into the next batch, I go back to finish decontamination operations in the mudroom. As is increasingly common these days, I am thrown sideways in time. It's the mid 1970s, and one of my younger siblings is sick. She's thrown up Cambell's vegetable soup all over the pea green carpet, somehow missing the pail next to the bed altogether.  My mom's out; my other siblings make gagging noises and somehow I am elected to clean it up.

I remember thinking I don't know how to do this, but I'll do my best.  I stop breathing through my nose.  I sop up the worst of the mess with a towel. Then I scrub with soap and water. Then I dry that up off the carpet the best I can with another towel. 

I was all of 8 or 9.  I remember being rather proud of my effort.

My mom seemed irritated when I told her about it later. I was surprised, because I had expected at least a thank you.

"But," I said, "No one else was going to do it. So I did it."

"Somebody had to," was all she replied. And that was the end of it. 

This is the fault line, so to speak. Just one instance in a long line of moments like them. 

Why not me?  Because who else?

For better or for worse, a life is defined by such moments.