I love my mother. Really. She is a fine woman. She is busy and intelligent and caring…and clean. Yet, there are things about her that drive me nuts. Seriously nuts. Most of those things are the same things I do…thanks to her and her impressing traits and habits on me as a young child. I hate the way she taps her foot. I do it. I hate the way she rearranges the food on her plate and clicks her spoon on her teeth. I do it. I hate the way she has to go OVERBOARD on things she gets involved in. I do it. I hate the way she obsesses about the little details of every little thing involving her family. I do it.
What I really wish is that instead of all these irritating little things, is that I would have inherited the organizational clean gene she has. She can usually find things…or spends many hours looking for them in all the categories and files she has stashed in the basement closet. She cleans things. Yah, dusts, vacuums, scrubs…a trait I seem to have skipped in my learning process.
So where is my organizing, clean gene? Well, I like to blame her for that, too. As a child I spent weekends helping clean house. It wasn’t hard labor or anything, but I learned early the truth of the matter is–I really didn’t like it. I would rather be outside helping on the ranch, working with the animals, even throwing bales or shoveling manure. I really wasn’t just lazy. I just didn’t care to worry about the dust building up on the very top ledge lining the kitchen cupboards or the fact the washing machine hadn’t been moved and vacuumed behind for the past three months. I sure as heck didn’t care about the mysterious place beneath the couch…a space my mother tended to be obsessed with.
Now the organizing thing…well, I get off on that…as long as it has to do with other people’s stuff…It is kind of like going to a motel…if it is the slightest bit dirty…YUCK! Disgusting. It is other people’s dirt. I have to wipe the floor and make sure I don’t touch the carpet more than I need to, but my own floor…well, where it can be seen…it’s dirty. The carpet probably has dog hair even if I just vacuumed. So, I obsess about other people’s office and workspace and closets. I’m really helpful…a true talent at organizing THEM…the poor disorganized things. My own house…still guess I don’t care all that much about the dirt…it sure would be nice to pretend the office was someone else’s and dive in with gusto to get it organized. Maybe I’ll try imagining I’m working for ME. I am a bit of a workaholic…that makes me a good employee for anyone and for ME…It just might work…since I can’t do anything about the missing gene thing. Thanks a lot, Mom.
June 5, 2008 at 10:51 am
Sheri,
See you changed the look of your blog a bit…looks good!
Your part about not really liking the inside cleaning work and prefering being on the ranch with animals, even with manure….that part reminds me of the short story ‘Boys and Girls’ by Alice Munro.
As long as it doesn’t affect our health and hygiene, I think it isn’t always necessary to be ‘spotless.’ In fact, can overcleaning also be a contributor to procrastination? Sometimes when I do a little bit too much polished cleaning, in search of that clean gene, I look at my finished spotless product, and say to myself, ‘Hmmm…I don’t feel real….it looks as if no one lives here….or they live on eggshells and don’t do anything here…it’s that clean!!!’
-patrick