The Pissed-Off Housewife

Cleaning is kind of like exercise for me. It feels so great once I'm done that you'd think that feeling would motivate me to do it more often. It doesn't. Housework makes me resentful. I spend my time with the dust cloth angrily thinking about all the better things I could be doing (research! volunteering at a charity! going to the gym!). The fact that I probably wouldn't actually be doing any of those things, and would more likely be reading or baking or watching Oprah, is completely lost on me. So, yeah, I'm a little delusional as well as messy.

I hate living with clutter and messiness, but I've never been a neat person. My mother used to exhaust herself yelling at me to pick up my room when I was younger. My half of my college dorm room was the one strewn with clothes (clean and dirty), books, and papers. In my current house the clutter used to accumulate until I got really cranky about it and flew into a maelstrom of cleaning and organizing.

A couple of years ago, when I was laid up with a back injury, my parents got me a housekeeper for six months. Oh, my God. HEAVEN.

I cannot express the difference it has made in our home. Not in just the obvious, hey! clean countertops! way, but in that I don't find myself bitching at my husband and kids as much, or feeling the resentment build until I break down and attack the clutter. It worked out so well, that I made some cuts in the budget to keep her on after the six months were up. She comes every two weeks, leaving me with just the tidying-up cleaning in between. I figured that I was the most pathetic person ever if I couldn't at least manage that.

I still need to work on the organizing, though. The kids bring home a small forest's worth of papers from school each week. Right now my "filing" technique involves piling them next to my dresser, which is an improvement over the crazy pile I used to keep in the dining room. Sigh. Baby steps.

Type A/B

Honestly, I am a bit anal about things. But I am also lazy. Soooooo.... I guess you'd call me a Type A/B.

I like things arranged just so. Symmetrical in space from one another. Preferably in anesthetically pleasing odd numbers. And I hate tiny flaws!! They just ruin otherwise perfect things.

But on the other hand, the cleanliness thing can be put off. I could let dust build up forEVER. Because I hate dusting. But the general appearance of the house is neat (with exception of the spare room.) Neat does not = clean, however. I like things to look arranged and orderly. Very orderly. I am an organizer. I love to organize stuff. I don't care much about the dust and stuff you don't see, though.

Until I get in a mood.....

Then I am psycho cleaning lady who cleans and organizes till it's all done. Perfectly.

See, I truly hate clutter. It makes me anxious. Our house is small, we don't have room for extra junk. The spare room is FILLED with stuff. But since I can shut the door, I don't let it stress me out. If I am in there more than 5 minutes, though, I get the urge to tackle it. But I usually put it off. There is no clutter in the rest of the house, though. Dust, yeah. Tumbleweeds of cat fluff, yeah. Clutter, hell no!!

Luckily we are on the same page in our house. Even Kyle is fairly neat. His Lego sets are all organized in their original boxes (and a ziploc if the box is falling apart, but he keeps the boxes for help on what the project is supposed to look like.) and they are in their own storage tubs. Then all the Star Wars stuff is in its own tub. And so on. With the exception of that damned spare room, our house is very organized.

I posted a picture from a shelf in my cabinets and one of the dreaded spare room. All the cabinets are arranged perfectly, labels out, and are not all mixed up (yes, I know that the green beans and corn are in the same row,as well as the mixed veggies and broth, but they share rows) lol. The spare room looks like a hurricane hit it. It gets organized and cleaned out 100% about twice a year. It's time is coming. Maybe this weekend.