Sunday morning was like the other mornings: after breakfast Margreet went out to work on the guests' floor. She collected all the laundry and brought it downstairs. That should keep the washing machines busy for a while! Humming, she went upstairs again.

In a bucket she made some soapy water and put a dishcloth in it. She placed the vacuum cleaner on the landing, with the plug already in the socket.

Piece by piece she went through the guest rooms to do her work. She took care of the flowers, emptied the wastebaskets, ran the damp dishcloth through the washbasin and over places which she saw had become dirty. Finally, she fleetingly went through it with the vacuum cleaner. It was always just a small job, but afterwards everything looked spotless again.

She was just about to start on the second room, when Lisa came upstairs. She greeted Margreet and stayed to watch for a moment. "Do you mind if I take care of that vacuum cleaner. Together we'll get through it even faster."

Margreet chuckled, "Is vacuuming a hobby of yours?"

Lisa shot up in laughter and shook her head, "No, it's not, but I would enjoy working up with you. And I saw how you did the vacuuming fleetingly, with the French stroke, and I don't mean that in a judgmental way, it's not a criticism, it's just convenient. If you do this every morning, it can never get really dirty. Do you always do under the bed only when there will come new guests?"

Margreet nodded affirmatively, "Yes, and even then I wonder what I do it for, it doesn't really seem necessary, but then you know for sure that it is really in order. And that's nice towards the guests."

She paused at the door of the only room that was currently empty. "Tomorrow my parents are coming for a midweek, here in this room, but it's already done, let's go to the next one."

Lisa looked at her frowning: "I wanted to say that it was nice for you that they are coming, but I get the impression that you don't like it at all yourself."

"You got that right, in fact I think it's awful. Just stay away from them Lisa, they are condescending to say the least, judgmental, controlling and everything else of that kind you can think of. So no, I'm not looking forward to it, rather I'm dreading it. They're coming tomorrow afternoon when we're out together. I love going out with you anyway, especially to that store, but this makes it even better! I don't have to feel obligated to be there when they get here. I hope Annerieke is well able to withstand their negativity! Do you know that Anton and Joke are staying an extra week, especially because of my parents? Just to be there for us, as a wall against the negativity..."

"What top friends they are, really great!" Lisa thought. "I hope you can avoid your parents a lot."

"I'm definitely going to try that, but I'm not going to flee them on the other side. I want to show myself and them that I can stand it." Margreet burst into laughter at herself. "The joke is that I have no idea yet if I can actually stand it!"

Lisa laughed with her, but then gave a tug on the vacuum cleaner. "Come on girl, it'll be fine, but let's get to work now or we won't be ready when the guests come upstairs."

.

When all the rooms were ready, Lisa walked with Margreet to see what else needed to be done. Margreet checked in the bathrooms to see how many clean towels and washcloths she needed. She opened the linen closet on the landing to get them out there and replenish the supply. She uttered a cry of surprise, "Lisa, you should smell it! Those towels already smell like Lavender!" She held out the pile to her and Lisa smelled. "Ow really, lovely! And how fast!" She sniffed the scent deeply again and then walked over to the closet door. "How cleverly you have done this. There's all the room at the door because those shelves are slightly laying back."

"I had noticed that the first time, and when I got that plan to hang these bushes in there, I knew right away that I had to hang them on the door. Well, so at least this plan is working fine. And last night I already got compliments from Cees and Sita on the flowers in their window sill. All really encouraging!"

They distributed the towels and washcloths to the bathrooms, hung new guest towels by the toilets, and cleaned the toilet, bathtub and wash basin in each bathroom. Finally, they ran a mop over the floor.

"Done! Thanks for your help Lisa! I enjoyed doing it together, but don't feel obligated to do anything for the next few days, it is my job after all."

"I'll take it one day at a time, I enjoyed it too! Can I help you with anything else?"

"No, I'm done for the moment. I can only hang the laundry after coffee. I'm going home until coffee time, knitting my cardigan. I'm already working on the second front panel. Then I have to figure out how to do the sleeves. I've done it before, but always from an existing pattern. I know roughly what the pattern for a sleeve looks like, but I still have no idea how to divide the stitches over the needles, where to increase and decrease, and how many... Maybe today I'll get around to drawing that pattern and calculating the proportions. I remember from that time when I went to draw and calculate the back part. Horrible Lisa, I could barely get it done. I got such a huge tension in my head and seemed to lose all overview. Annerieke sat with me. That was special, she didn't say much, only gave a tip if I really couldn't work it out. After a while the tension eased and I managed to put the description together. According to Annerieke this tension had to do with a piece of emotional healing. She reassured me that I now know that I don't have to be afraid of such a strong reaction in my body, it's part of the healing of emotional wounds. Then I guess you know that, if you get upset once... it will pass, it really will! And if at such a time you feel you want someone from us there, please come or call us! We'll be happy to help you through it!"

"I will! Annerieke also said something like that, apparently I really do have something to look forward to! Last night that happened for a while. I pretty flipped for a moment. When the worst was over, I grabbed my violin and played my pain out. That helped quite a bit. After coffee, I started reading. I took out a series of three books. Well, after just a few pages I was so into the story that it was hard for me to stop reading. So I will now continue with that book for a while. Good luck with your knitting Margreet!"

"Thank you! And you, enjoy your reading!"

To chapter 61. How do you do that, having relationship

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