Clean your room!

Chores. That's the subject here - you know: laundry, dishes, vacuuming, dusting, toilets, shower doors, and all that other stuff we love to hate.

I have a long-term love-hate relationship with chores. As a child, I was told every Saturday to go clean my room. This was because during the week I did not do those trivial things like put my clothes/books/etc. way in a timely fashion. So Saturdays became the Day of Reckoning, and also became a battle of wills. Mom told me to go clean my room, and so upstairs I went. Except that I generally laid on my bed and read, instead.

I'm still fighting that battle 30 years later. I would rather read than do most anything, and reading these days has been greatly expanded by the never-ending supply of material available on the Internet. Who wants to sweep the front porch, dust the shelves, scrub the shower, or mop the floor when there's so much still to read?

When I actually get around to doing the chores, I have definite preferences: I like clean clothes, and a closet full of stuff ready-to-wear, and the damply-warm-flowery smells that emit from the dryer vent on a cold day BUT I hate folding and putting the clothes away! I did not like it as a kid, I did not like it when I was a nanny and did the family's laundry, and I do not like it as an adult. DarlingMan is good about doing this part of this particular chore when he's home (for BOTH our wardrobes), but as that is not the case at the moment, I am faced with a load in the dryer waiting for me (it's jammie pants and jeans, so not too much wrinkling to worry about).

Vacuuming, on the other hand, is pretty fun. I think it's the "instant gratification" aspect, especially when using nozzles on things like baseboards and windowsills. You can really SEE the difference, and it's rewarding. In the interest of full disclosure I'll admit that vacuums were fraught with peril for me in my youngest years; I was terrified of the industrial-strength/sized "fweepers" [derived from "sweeper," which is what my dad called vacuums] that the maids used in the motels/restaurants my family owned. I don't how this phobia began or how it dissipated, but it's family lore now. So it's kinda funny that vacuuming is a chore that's slightly higher on the current preference list.

The two domiciles I lived in before this one featured master bathrooms with glass shower walls and doors. BAD BAD BAD!!! Do you think I was inclined to clean these regularly? Nooooooooo. I didn't let them get grossly slimy, but there were definite areas of hard-water build-up up that were bitches to clean upon move-out. So when buying this house, a HUGE selling point was the Travertine tile "walk-in"-style DOORLESS shower in the master bath. LOVE IT!!!

Turns out that writing is a good way to avoid chores as well. But maybe I better go get those clothes out of the dryer.