Oct 25th - Cleaning

So cleaning isn't my most favourite thing to do but I must admit that I am a little bit particular in this area. I don't ever do a huge fall or spring cleaning and clean my house in a week. For many years I've done, like, one or two rooms a week and tried to get through my house in a month. I spot clean and dust and clean bathrooms and vacuum daily.


But I never feel like I'm on top of the world for cleaning. My dear mother-in-law is the world's cleanest lady and I never measure up. She never makes me feel that way, it's my own interpretation. But when she came over to help me set up for a Christmas business party one year she came in with stuff to spot clean my carpet. And I was just thinking about enough food and chairs at that stage of the game. That just tells you how different we all are.


Sometimes I come home and see my house through different eyes and usually I think, Hey, it's not too bad in here! I think my biggest thing that makes me feel like things are messy and dirty is disorganization. Little piles of this and that sitting around drive me completely batty. I do definitely have zones that get hit bad but there's nothing quite like the feeling of totally cleaned off countertops and a place for everything and everything in it's place.


I am fiercely choleric and a lot of melancholy on this subject. I would nine times out of ten do a quick job and not necessarily a perfect job of cleaning. Also, I would almost always choose a way that to me looks appealing and spend a little bit more time on looks than making sure every crack and crevice is spotless. One thing I do love is clean windows and I'll do many quick window cleanings during summer on my front windows and my main lived in rooms. But I'm doing good to get my bedroom windows cleaned twice a year, partly because they're way up and hard to reach.


I obsess about cleaning garbage up off the yard and making sure the grass stays green and edging beds and trees and spraying weeds. And parking things in rows and lining things up and stuff. Now doesn't that sound almost like an obsessive compulsive confession? And I'm tremendously bossy and get all my men to help me with it all. But really, Pat is always supportive of the tidying and cleaning and the boys helping. I think we've both thought that everyone is happier if they help out. And Pat himself is fiercely particular about looks and cleanliness and so is his family. And perhaps, that is partly why it's important to me too. Whew.


So many confessions. Who would've guessed that was all waiting to escape the pen?


I'm not going back to edit. All I ask is that you'll still be my friend! ;)