Following her divorce this past November, local elementary school teacher Angela Harrison has turned to her Roomba for comfort, tending to it as though it is her own child.
“Ang really didn’t adjust well to the divorce at first. She was kind of in a rut, and I didn’t think she was going to come out for a while. Then she got this Roomba, and it seems like it’s really turned her life around,” commented Marcia Burnstein, long-time friend and colleague of Harrison.
Harrison has reportedly taken comfort in the “little beeps” that the Roomba emits whenever it bumps into something or needs to be charged. Friends cited her “almost obsessive need to make sure the device is okay” every time its sensor sounds.
“It’s pretty confusing going to my mom’s apartment. I’ll hear her talking, and I think it’s to me, but usually she’s just talking to the vacuum. I think it makes her miss dad a little less,” said Jason, Harrison’s biological son, whom she has custody every other weekend.
According to family and friends, Harrison has taken to “deliberately dropping crumbs on the floor” with the intention of feeding her newfound electronic companion. Upon the device’s picking them up, she has consistently offered it praise and congratulations for its hard work.
At press time, Harrison was seen correcting her guests’ grammar when they refer to her Roomba as “it” rather than “him.”
