The UPS Guy Thinks I’m a Nudist

Yes, you read the title correctly.  The UPS guy comes here often, and far too often (for his liking especially, I’m sure), he catches glimpses of me racing past the front door buck naked.  Rather than take personal responsibility for this, I am going to blame it on the design of our house.  You see, our bedroom is on one side of the main floor of our home, while the laundry room is on the other.  To get from one to the other, you have to pass by the front door, which is surrounded by uncovered windows.  I know, you are wondering what all of this has to do with me being naked.  But you are also most likely assuming that I, like you, am a good housekeeper, and that all of my clothes are neatly hung in my closet.  Your assumptions are very, very wrong.

The majority of my clothes, and those of the rest of my family, are cascading out of hampers in the laundry room into mountainous piles of clean laundry on the floor in front of, as well as on top of, the dryer.  This means that my closet and dresser drawers are often pretty much, well, empty.  So when I get out of the shower and go look for some clothes to put on, I head not to my closet, but to the laundry room.  This really isn’t a big deal if I have folded and put away the bath towels, or at least a bathrobe at any rate.  But how often do you think I’ve done that?!  The correct answer is rarely, so that necessitates a mad dash to the laundry room, past the front door and all of its windows.

Our bedroom looks out to the back of our property, so there are no windows in the front of the house that I could first peek through to be sure we haven’t any visitors.  I’ll often hover near my bedroom door and listen for someone on the porch, but that UPS guy and his big box truck are surprisingly quiet.  I always think I’m in the clear, but rush past the front door just to be on the safe side.  And still, quite often,  I end up streaking the poor balding guy in the brown shorts.

So allow me to take a little detour here, and tell you about the most fabulous idea I’ve come up with!  The family closet!  Rather than putting your clothes in the bedroom closet, you would put the whole family’s assortment of clothes in one giant room that would serve as a family closet.  This room could have custom cabinets, drawers and hanging rods throughout, a section for each member of the family, as well as an ironing station, and a washer and dryer.  Wait, since this is my fantasy room, why not throw in two washers and two dryers!  Then everything would always be in the same place, and there would be no need to shuffle clothes from laundry room to closet and back again.  You would, of course, still have the bedroom closet, but its purpose would be primarily as a stashall for when you need to clean up in a hurry.  Brilliant, right?!

One of my girlfriends is building a custom home this summer.  She and her husband essentially started with a blank slate when meeting with architects and designers.  They were free to build whatever they wanted (within budget parameters), so I told her that I really thought she must include a room for the family closet.  Sadly, she didn’t share my vision, and while their home is progressing beautifully, it is doing so without what I consider to be the most important room in a house.  All I can say is that if we ever build a new home, ours will definitely have a family closet!

So back to the UPS guy and my propensity for nudity in his presence.  Let me tell you the worst case scenario, which recently happened.  The boys love watching for the box truck, and then chatting up the driver while he fills our front porch with boxes of baby bedding.  We never know exactly when he will show up.  He may come at 11am a few days in a row, and then at 2pm.  And then, to really mix it up, he might show up at 8:30am.  So I think the mystery surrounding his arrival is as exciting to the boys as his pleasant company.

On this particular morning, I was rushing from my room to the laundry room, in my birthday suit, of course, when I heard the sound of those heavy brown work boots hit the first step of the front porch.  Hayden heard it, too.  I kicked my pace up to high gear, trying to get all the way past the windows before he made it to the door.  I hadn’t been able to find a towel in the bathroom, so I was dripping wet, which wasn’t so good.  Our main floor has terracotta tile throughout, which can be deadly when wet.  Wouldn’t you know that just as I slipped and fell flat on my back, right in the middle of the entry way, Hayden got to the front door as well?  As I lay splayed on the floor, I yelled to Hayden, “Don’t open that door!”.  But that’s kind of like telling him not to laugh when you tickle him.  Next thing I know, the UPS guy is standing in my doorway, while I am literally butt naked on the floor in front of him, with nothing around to cover up with.  I don’t know who of us was more embarrassed, but Hayden took it completely in stride and said, “Look.  Mommy.  Bombom (his word for derriere).  Funny!”

Thanks, buddy.

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