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• What Does a Girl Do?

I read a back issue of Real Simple this weekend that had a long feature about cleaning strategies. The author emphasized the need to stay on top of clutter and keep your home organized in a way that suits your habits and lifestyle, not in a way that you think you need to live. For some reason, this article really struck a chord with me. I don’t live in squalor, by any means, but I teeter on the brink of hoarder-dom, and I can be very lazy about picking up after myself. I live alone, so it’s easy to just throw my work clothes over a chair, never make my bed, and do enough dishes to keep the counters and sink free for other things. I make myself sound like a disgusting pig, but I think it’s pretty normal twentysomething living.

This really depresses me for some reason. I can hardly stand to come home and see clutter or dirty dishes or an unmade bed, yet I don’t have the desire or the energy to deal with the daily cleaning tasks. Compared to my parents and the house I grew up in, I live in a spotless home, and my family thinks I’m a special breed of neat-freak. This neat-freak business was true up until a few months ago when I just sort of gave up on neatness. I go crazy once a month or so and attack selective parts of the bathrooms, kitchen, and other living spaces. I do laundry when it piles up so much that I can’t shut the laundry room door to conceal the source of my shame. I don’t fold it unless there’s no place to keep piling the clean stuff. I go through closets and get rid of extra boxes that can’t be reused and update my book and CD collections when insomnia strikes. Anal-retentiveness is soothing to me. When I’m anxious, I clean. When I’m stressed, I organize. I buy plastic storage bins and carefully fill them, I borrow a label maker, I alphabetize, I go through t-shirts that are ten years old and determine which three are ready to be sacrificed to the dusting gods. I’m a robot of unstoppable efficiency when I’m restless.

So in the interest of working on my personal Cleaning Strategy, I decided to make some changes this weekend. I scrubbed out my oven and emptied the refrigerator of old leftovers, expired yogurt, and nearly-empty juice cartons. I made a schedule for cleaning frequencies so that I won’t be overwhelmed and feel like I’ve been robbed of my weekends. I rearranged closets and storage space so that I have room for my shoes, incentive to hang my clothes up after work, and cleared a ton of crap out of my back closet (it’s a walk-in closet that is FULL of boxes and other crap for when I move, as well as out of season clothes and things I can’t bear to part with). I went through multiple rolls of paper towels and an entire package of kitchen sponges. And my place is sparkling, except for the mountain of clean laundry on my bedroom floor, which is on the schedule to be attacked tomorrow night. I finally am at a point where twenty or thirty minutes a day several times per week will give me some sort of control over the things that need to be done and I can stop freaking out about losing entire weekends to keeping up with the cleaning and laundry. (Seriously, how do people with spouses and children keep up with this? It’s just me and two cats here, not a family of six. I have no excuse.) Spreadsheets are the bane of my existence, but they help me feel like I have control over my life. Charting out my adult responsibilities, like healthy grocery lists and menu planning, makes perfect sense to me and gives me a few more things to check off my to-do list on a weekly basis. And, there are several Cleaning Strategy-related items on my list of 104 Things to do in 2004, so all of this neurotic behavior has the added bonus of fulfilling some of my goals for the year.

And, I made some decisions this weekend, such as the one about moving this fall. No matter what, I’m moving. I don’t really like this town – it’s so family oriented and not very singles-friendly - and while my job is MUCH more tolerable than it was at this time last year, it’s not a career and I’m far from satisfied. My Former, Very Evil Boss left my department and I love my current boss, and I think I could gain a lot of valuable experience in the next six months, but that would be the tipping point. So, I gave my newly-updated resume to a headhunter – the word “headhunter” sounds a little creepy, but he’s a college friend’s father and specializes in placing people with 2-5 years of work experience…which is exactly where I am in my career. I asked him to hold off until the summer because I can’t break my lease. I really don’t want to leave my job until the fall because I’m lazy and it will take me several months to reduce my total possessions to a reasonable amount and find an apartment and interview for jobs and all that stuff. Not to mention the sheer expense of moving – ugh.

And in other decision-making news, I’m going to JournalCon this summer! I am very lucky in that I have some awesome roommates already lined up (some Red Headed Angels are letting this brunette be included in their fun room, especially nice of them considering they’ve never met me). And, BWI means cheap airfare – I can probably fly out there for $200 round-trip and it will be right after the dreaded (six months of) budget season at work, when I will really need a damn vacation. So, I’m going, even though I’m very new at this, because I can. And, lots of pretty Mathletes will be there for me to meet, which is super-exciting. I need to start working on my alcohol tolerance level now in order to avoid alcohol poisoning in Washington, D.C.

And with that rambling out of the way, I need to get back to my list – I still have to clean the shower and iron some clothes tonight to stay on schedule.