I admit it. Vacuums are my vice. There, I said it. Acceptance is the first step in recovery right? I have a thing for cordless, bagless, advanced swivel steering, and a powerful motorized brush. Add the pet care attachments?! Woo girl, you had me at cordless! Seriously, my wife could take me shopping at the Mall (yes, I still go there) and I’d hustle right on past the Victoria Secret mannequins and head straight to Sears (really sad) vacuum display! HOLLER!!! I can see myself now testing the newest models with the most powerful suction and allergen filters! I know what’s going to be on MY Christmas list this year! I hope Santa has been busy building Shark Navigators and Dyson Balls!! He can just put that bad boy on MAX POWER and vacuum the chimney on the way down!

But that’s where I am now as a Stay at Home Dad (SAHD). Every night after dinner, heads down, blissfully watching dog hair, grass blades, and Smarties vacuumed away into the ether!  (Okay, not really “the ether”. Actually into the extra-large bagless dust cup. But still, away.) I enter a zen-like state induced by purring of the motor and whirring of the bristles on the stair tool attachment. Skillfully maneuvering around chairs, book bags, kids, and dogs as if I was winning Gold in the vacuuming Olympics!

My kids are not huge fans of my vacuum fetish, though. Like my teenage daughter, in particular, wasn’t happy about the time when I burst into her room while she was Snaptiming or Facechatting with a boy-who-is-her-friend with the Shark on MAX POWER, really loud, heads down, and shouting “JUST PRETEND I AM NOT HERE! JUST PRETEND I AM NOT HERE!” (Which, when you think about it, is ironically redundant because she would pretend I was not there anyway!).  Ok, that did not go over well. And she almost beat me with my curtain vacuum extender tube! But her floor was SUPER CLEAN! Thank you, Dad!

And sure there are times, after a long day, when I’ve had a few beers in the garage… and I start staring at the shop vac with the 6 ft extender wet/dry attachment and wonder what have I become? The cordless drills, saws, and screwdrivers barely turn my head these days. But, that old blue Hoover with the retractable power cord in the corner next to the weed whacker? Whoa! Four words: You. Still. Look. Fine! Grrrrrrrrrr!!!! And then, there I am, drinking beers, and vacuuming the garage alone at 10 o’clock at night.  Ahhh, but SAHD’s gotta have some vices, yo!  Let’s just say my floors are like 40 Shades of Grey ‘cuz I just took 10 off with the Hoover.

Dad’s Rock!