When it comes to housework the one thing no book of household management can ever tell you is how to begin. Or maybe I mean why. ~Katharine Whitehorn, "Nought for Homework," Roundabout, 1962
I've just spent about 2 or 3 hours cleaning around the house--you know, sweeping and mopping, scrubbing and shining. Some of the things I cleaned were *really dirty* too, as if I hadn't cleaned them in some time. Oh wait, I hadn't.
Dull women have immaculate homes. ~Anonymous
I don't really like doing chores and housework. Really, who does? Okay, so there was that girl I was friends with my frosh year, who was always coming over and trying to clean my house. "Let's vacuum!" she'd say, "You can go around picking up all the things that are too big to vacuum up, and I'll follow behind you." Umm, yeah, right sweety. Sounds like a gay ol' time. I wasn't friends with her very long.
Housework can't kill you, but why take a chance? ~Phyllis Diller
Even though I don't like cleaning, I dislike living in a dirty house even more, and thus am encouraged to clean (it's for my own good). I never feel like I can accomplish any goals or get anything done in a dirty house. This creed has been heard the world over, sure, touted by many a cleaning-and-organization guru. It's true, don'tcha know. And so I clean.
Love is the thing that enables a woman to sing while she mops up the floor after her husband has walked across it in his barn boots. ~Hoosier Farmer
I clean, and I clean, and as I clean, a miraculous thing starts to happen: I start to have fun. Music blaring, Swiffer© in hand, and I get into what I'm doing, dancing and scrubbing the floors and trying to sing along despite my physical exertion. At this point in my cleaning, I am beyond stopping and must finish what I've started, be it a single type of chore, a room, or the whole apartment. Well, I take that back; there is one thing that can kick my out of my cleaning groove: company.
Housework is a treadmill from futility to oblivion with stop offs at tedium and counter productivity. ~Erma Bombeck
I don't mean company in the way of guests and visitors, I mean simply the presence of another. That's the thing about me and cleaning: I don't like to clean, but to really get anything done I must be alone. That's when the loud music can start and the dirt and grime come to an antiseptic end. If there's someone else around, things can get complicated. I have to wait for them to finish something before I can finish my task, or they're in my way, or they want to show me something, or whatever. Cleaning for me is a mindspace which only I can be present to witness.
A bright person can always think of something better to do than housework. ~Ruby Lou Barnhill
Given this, you can see why it is that maintaining the house has been so difficult for me in the past few months since Makal's not been working a steady job. Before he was out of the house on a regular schedule, and I could arrange my alone-time however best benefited me. But with Him around all the time, or gone for only a short period of time, I've not been able to focus and get into the zone. He's probably the worst offender of distracting me while I'm trying to get something done (and He knows it). And if I suddenly find myself with a few free hours while he's out, I'm often more tempted to spend it doing stuff just for me--I'm one of those people who needs regular alone time to really keep track of myself.
The best time for planning a book is while you're doing the dishes. ~Agatha Christie
There's no real point to me posting any of this, save that I was cleaning today and it was therefore on my mind. And I did manage to focus and not waste my time, getting all the floors vacuumed, swept, and mopped, most of the bathroom scrubbed and some laundry done. It's good to see the results too and know that I used my time effectively. I'm just hoping that I can learn to focus on cleaning when Makal is home so that I can keep house better and maintain the work I did today. As long as he doesn't distract me (ahem), I think we'll be okay.
Don't cook. Don't clean. No man will ever make love to a woman because she waxed the linoleum - "My God, the floor's immaculate. Lie down, you hot bitch." ~Joan Rivers
2 comments:
My roommate is obsessed with cleaning. It's like doing "spring cleaning" every other week. That's a little much.
Me, I'm not so much of a neat freak.
Good thing I'll be moving once the school year is up. Phew!
On the bright side, you won't have to worry about her going away for a few days and being forced to live with the smell emanating from that tuna-and-egg sandwhich that is long-lost under her bed somewhere...
:)
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