Thanks to one reason or another, I’ve been the one in charge of getting the kids to bed for the past several days. Last night, my wife went in after I’d finished.

As soon as she opened my youngest son’s door, I heard her shriek, “What is this?”

I ran from the kitchen to see what the story was. My son was sitting up in bed, blinking in the light and looking shocked.

“What is this?” my wife repeated, pointing at piles of pants, shirts, and sweaters that towered in front of his desk. Some had tipped over, spilling clothes under the desk. Others leaned precariously against his chair, tilting so far that their tops touched each other above its seat.

I honestly don’t know how I hadn’t noticed the mess. It must have just blended in with the rest of his room.

“My clothes,” he said.

“Why aren’t they in your drawers?”

He looked both surprised and confused by the question. “Um. . .”

“You. . . You are going to clean these up! All this laundry I’ve been doing, all the folding, and you’ve just been throwing them on the floor!”

Actually, I can’t remember the entire speech she gave, but I think you can get the gist of it. I slunk quietly away before she realized that I should have been seeing those piles growing over the past several evenings.

I loved his attitude, though. He’d apparently just decided that there was no reason to put the clothes in the drawers. After all, he was just going to be taking them out again. Why not just leave them in a pile by the door?