The Trials and Tribulations of Keeping Your Minivan Clean

A few weeks ago, my best friend stopped by my house for something. I honestly can't remember the exact circumstances right now, but for some reason her son saw the interior of my van, and like many children, was just brutally honest with me: "Miss Rabia, your van is a mess. It's not clean like my mom's van."

I laughed out loud because:

1. He was right about my van being a mess.
2. Her van is usually just as "clean" as mine.

I mentioned it to her and she laughed too. He was only pointing it out because she had just made them clean out their van in preparation for a family trip. Her van really was clean when I looked into it.
It's nice to have a best friend who is on the same page as you are. Her kids can be brutally honest with me and vice versa and no one gets their feelings hurt. I can give her kids "the look" and they will usually understand the need to adjust their behavior. Julie once actually drove across town to scold my kids for being jerks because I was so stressed out and had very tearfully vented to her about being about to lose my mind. In fact, she showed up with a fast food burger and fries and sent me out to her van to eat and watch her kids, while she went inside and had a "come to Jesus" talk with mine.

Julie has a way of being able to say things to me that no one else can. She can call me out for being petty, or lazy, or otherwise unkind. She has held to her end of the bargain as an accountability partner, even showing up one night to make sure I was doing the housecleaning I had mentioned I was going to be doing. 

We frequently vent to one another as friends tend to do. My favorite response from her? "Do you want me to listen while you vent, or offer suggestions when you're done?" That really resonated with me because there have definitely been times with other people where I got the opposite reaction than the one I needed and left the venting session feeling worse than before.

I got my subject for this month's Secret Subject Swap and jokingly sent it to Julie. I asked her what she would write a book about. "The trials and tribulations of keeping your minivan clean." was her reply. I can't possibly hate that book. It's all truth. And the van is only clean once or twice a season. Or for most mortals, anyway.

Your “Secret Subject” is: Your best friend has written a book and wants you to read it. You hate it. What do you say? It was submitted by: http://www.southernbellecharm.com

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This week 11 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts.

Here are links to all the sites now featuring Secret Subject Swap posts. Sit back, grab a cup, and check them all out. See you there:

Baking In A Tornado
Cognitive Script
The Blogging 911
The Lieber Family Blog 
The Bergham Chronicles
Simply Shannon
Southern Belle Charm
Bookworm in the Kitchen
Part-time Working Hockey Mom
Not That Sarah Michelle
Climaxed