| Sunny Side Up June 19, 2002 �2002, Kathleen Gibson It's your performance that counts A visiting friend offered to sweep the floor after breakfast. I fetched our broom from the closet�a rather odd, green and black one. �I�ve never seen one like that before,� she said. �We bought it at Agribition a few years ago. According to the commercials it�s the best name in brooms.� �Oh.� She looked doubtful, but started pushing the black rubber blade across the floor. �Not like that,� I corrected. �You have to pull it toward you when the squeegee side�s down.� �Oh,� she said again, and obeyed�for a few seconds. Then she turned the broom over; tried the side with the bristles. She worked quietly for a few minutes, until she came to the narrow space between the fridge and the stove. (The broom doesn�t fit in there.) Then she tried to collect the fur tumbleweed lurking under the microwave shelf. Same thing. That was when she exploded. �I hate your broom!� She slapped the floor with it on every word. �It�s heavy. The bristles don�t bend. It has no spring to it and it�s too big to get into the small spaces. Plus�it skips stuff.� Moses the cat, unused to such enthusiastic verbiage so early in the morning, slid off his perch and slunk into the front room. I watched his tail snake around the corner. I had to admit it. More than once I�d thought that tail would make a better broom than my broom. I said as much. �Why do you keep it then?� my friend asked, calmer now that she�d cleared her emotional sinuses. �Well, we paid forty dollars for that silly broom and the salesman said it should last for a decade at least. I�m trying to make it pay for itself.� It�s been seven years now, and I�m still trying. But my daughter�s home for the summer. She brought with her a saucy little blue and white sweeper with magnetic yellow bristles that bend. It has a nice spring to it; it pokes neatly into the small spaces, and it weighs about the same as a celery head. Plus, it doesn�t skip stuff. Obviously, she too prefers her own broom. I�ve been using it when she�s not looking. I�d forgotten what a pleasure it is to sweep the floor when your partner conforms to your every move. Almost like dancing. I remember watching my mother sweep our kitchen floor when I was growing up. She hummed to the rhythm they made, she and that straw broom. The bigger the dust pile, the louder she hummed. Her broom only cost a dollar-forty-nine at Woodwards. My daughter�s was three bucks at a Bargain store. It �shows to go ya,� as my father loves to say. The value of a tool isn�t determined by its worthy name�it�s performance that counts. Some tools take their good name in vain. Same with Christians, I say. You can respond to this column at [email protected] |
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