The High Power Vacum Life

So.......I had to borrow that church's vacuum the other day.
My Dad brought it in.
It's been sitting in the corner of my kitchen the whole week.

This morning, as I'm waiting for Luna to get ready,
I looked around my kitchen floor and, to my disbelief, found....a mess. 
(Seems like daylight makes crumbs suddenly jump out and around)
I went to reach for the broom...when...suddenly...
the tiny mouse-looking church vacuum caught my eye.

I have very little faith in vauums...they usually....well...they suck
"Ugh", I thought, "I guess it'll be quicker."
I checked out all the workings,
complained that it had a bag and it was almost full...
then plugged the sucker in and turned it on.

"Hm...Wow. This little bugger isn't half bad."

It has that front part that's twisty and bendy and can reach around every corner.
It had a retractable cord and was really light to drag around.
When the kitchen was done I peaked around the door
figuring to test this new gadget on my hall carpet.

Holy shit.. It grabbed on to the carpet like a tick to a dog.
It swiveled and moved and sucked every little particle out of every little crevice.
I couldn't believe it...I was hooked.

The thoughts tornadoed around...

"Where can I buy one of these? Amazing!
I wonder how much it costs. I bet it's like $200 bucks...
I'm broke...I don't have $200.
But wait.......if I don't go to therapy this week...hm...well that'll save me $150
which means the vacuum would only really cost me $50. Wow!
having this great vacuum can bring me much longer lasting sanity than one little session of therapy, right?"


The cord was long, and I was pumped.
By this point I had reached the living room and there was no turning back.
So I ran to unplug it (yes, already bitching about how I'd improve this thing by making the cord even  longer)
 
And that's when it happened.....

You see...the "on" switch is on the stem of the handle.
But it's no regular "on/off" thing like you'd think,
Nope, this shit slides...it slides from "low" to "high" and everywhere in between.

I'll be damned...the thought popped so quickly into my head.
"Why the hell would ANYONE...EVER...wanna use this thing on low? I mean come on!"

I tried going through the scenarios:
Maybe different types of carpet...or maybe for furniture or drapes...I don't know.
But seriously, even when vacuuming those things... why wouldn't you want to suck the hell out of them?
High power could suck every piece and sparkle and speck of dust imaginable...
and high power could suck the hell out of a couch cushion..
Not just the stuff on the fabric..
but the dust and dirt and, God forbid, mites that are deep in the cushion.
No way!..It's High, I tell u!!! HIGH all the Way!!!
I can't ever imagine or want to foresee myself sliding my thumb down that button to anything but HIGH.
Believe me when I say...this shit is strong.

Well, of course, you could come up with so many different metaphors for my way of thinking.
But the most strinking one to me, is the one that broke me down this week...
The very..same..one!


Teresa always...has to...knows no other way than to...do everything on High.
I think to myself,  what is the point?
If I'm going to be doing something...getting something done...it's going to be done on High
sucking everyhing out...making sure I get down to the best and deepest level.
Yes....I only work on High speed.
Everything else just feels like a waste to me.

I'm sure you can imagine.
I have broken, probably blown out, every vacuum I've ever had.
With this borrowed one, even.
I had started by looking inside and seeing that the bag was already pretty full.
But I kept going anyway.
And I'm sure that...after my vacuming escapade...that bag is filled toward explosion.

You know the reason I had to borrow the little mouse vac to start with?

It was because my other vac was out of order.
My other vac...which my Dad introduced me to during a scouring spree
when we first got to this house and the dirty cellar needed to be blasted out clean.
My Dad let me borrow......A SHOPVAC!....
Yes, a glorious Extra high powered shopvac...the kind used on construction sites.
Before I knew it, it was up from the cellar and devouring my carpet and couch and stairs.
The suction was so powerful compared to my broken down Dyson
I could not turn away. I used that shop vac all year. And finally it crashed.
The filter was so damn clogged and exhausted.
It could serve no more until it was replaced.

That's what happened in my life this week.
I have a million things on my shoulders. (I've blogged and bitched about those things already)
They are already too many things for one person to reasonably handle,
but above that....I, because I'm Teresa...do every one of them on "High" power.
And it broke...me...down.

I know that last night I wrote about accepting every part of you
Even the part about how I'd powerwash my mind
I talked about just accepting myself as...well that's how I am.
I'm always working on High..Powerwash...Shopvac..Super Sonic levels
I radically accept that about myself....I think
but....that means I have to radically accept the consequences
and when it comes to an intense, high power everything life,
the consequences are hard and harsh and exhausting.

I need to learn that working on "low" of "medium" or anything other than "High" can get the job done too.
There are delicate jobs or simple jobs...like the underside of the couch cushions or the drapes
those jobs that will get done well enough with just one low level effort.
I can leave the shop vac high level suction powerwashing work for the hard stuff..
that hard stuff is inevitably there and always will be.
But if I do it ALL on "high". I'm going to crash...I saw that this week.

This weekend I worked on a presentation for one of my classes.
It's a simple thing only worth 15% of my grade.
I have everything I need for it. Have done all the work.
And yet.....I am trying to make it into a master piece.
Cause that's what I do.
And I'm still searching...looking to suck more in than I need to know.

Welll......not today! I have tons of other work left...
So today. I'm going to throw it into low...cram what I have into a simple 10 minute PowerPoint
and then......enjoy the fact that its done.