Column: Something About Nothing

It is the bunny time of year again. Not only are stuffed and chocolate bunnies popping up in stores, live bunnies are skittering across our yards, hiding under bushes and making us ooh and ahh at their cuteness.

There are other bunnies that are not quite so nice. I am talking about the dust bunnies that seem to be taking over my house. I don’t understand it. I was used to lots of dust and dog hair when we had Sam. When you have animals and pets dust bunnies seem to come along with the territory.

However, the dust bunnies in my house seem to be multiplying all by themselves. I can Swiffer and sweep and vacuum and think I got them all. I turn my head for a second and there they are again, scooting across the floor with a little help from a draft.

Not only are the dust bunnies accumulating on my floor they are accumulating on the surfaces of my tables and woodwork.

We do not have forced air heat. We have radiators. Radiators do not throw out dust. I must have unusual radiators because the dust is abounding.

When I had kids at home I would have explained it away as kids running in and out of my house. Kids attract dust. There are no kids in my house. There are no pets in my house. There are just two old people.

I should clarify that. There are just two old people that don’t like dust, but the dust seems to like them. There is the adage opposites attract and we are attracting the dust.

One of the reasons those dust bunnies are so annoying to me is I have an allergy to dust. I have an allergy to dusting, too.

Dust mites flourish in everything. They hide in carpets ( I have no carpets in my home). They hide in beds and mattresses. I do like to sleep on a soft cushion. According to Wikipedia, dust mites like to feed on dead human cells. Since I have so much dust we must really be shedding. Sam left so we don’t have his hair but our skin must be shedding invisibly. Apparently, according to Wikipedia, dust mites did not become a problem until humans began to use textiles such as blankets and clothing.

My dust is sometimes fluffy dust. It clumps together to look fluffy as a cloud. I wonder if I could stuff stuffed bunnies with my fluffy dust. I could market my stuffed dust bunnies to people who have a vendetta against someone who has a dust allergy. They would never suspect a cute stuffed bunny to have secret vendetta qualities.

Yes Easter is right around the corner. Here comes Peter Cottontail hopping down the bunny trail. What the tail doesn’t tell you is fluffy bunny tail looks just like the dust bunnies in my house. Maybe Peter Cottontail and his friends are visiting when I am not looking. Maybe the bumps I hear at night are Peter and his friends hopping down the bunny trail in the middle of my house leaving pieces of themselves behind.

“Perhaps I should post a sign on my door with this quote on it: Please don’t feed the dust bunnies.” —Author unknown

 

Wells resident Julie Seedorf’s column appears every Monday. Send email to her at thecolumn@bevcomm.net.