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Are you a good housekeeper? I need some good housekeepers to mentor me, and teach me how to pass that trait on to my children. My mom is lousy at it, but her mom is a neat freak and germophobe. I suppose Mom’s a pendulum swing, because Granny is so extreme that she washes her ground beef twice before cooking it to “get the blood out.” Hamburgers aren’t really her best meal. On the other hand, my dad is all about being organized and he’s fairly clean. My mom’s disorder seemed to dominate the house, though.
When I started dating Chris, I saw this pattern again. I used to detail my car once a week, and I had a day for every chore in the house. The first time I saw the inside of his car, I freaked out — where was I supposed to sit? He assured me it was supposed to be somewhere on top of all those Dr. Pepper cans. I suggested I drive. But within a year of hanging around him, I was utterly corrupted. That is to say, my precious Cavalier was just as junky as his. How did it happen? I’ve never quite understood that transformation, but it’s there.
For the next decade and a half, I’ve been on a quest to get back to that natural cleanliness. I find my brain feels cluttered when my environment is. My strong drive to work and produce doesn’t translate very well in my household. My enthusiasm is nil as long as the kitchen and bathroom are basically hygienic. I do have a brand new Dyson vacuum though, which has been a source of inspiration. Dysons are a nifty bagless design, and I love that part of it. Something about being able to see how nasty each room got in the three days since the last vacuuming makes me oddly excited, too.
This week, my 7 year old asked me about an allowance. Generally when he has been given money in the past, I’ve been the one to keep up with it, so I’d just distribute money on an “as needed” basis. I decided to seize the opportunity. If they can do their part in keeping the house clear of their clutter, it will go a long way. I’d love to cut out those weekly torture sessions when we all work on their room for a couple of hours. Quite frankly, where it stands with us now is unacceptable, so I’m trying this. I don’t like nagging them, and closing their door at all times so I don’t know about the mess isn’t working either. I surely am not about to clean up their messes, because I feel that would be teaching them laziness and irresponsibility.
We made out a chart with a daily checklist. Everyday, they have 12 points to check off on their list, plus a section for “bonus points” that will come from me not having to nag, extra good behavior, or other things. I plan to be generous with the bonus points when their attitude is good. Each item on the list is worth a penny. Since they were asking for a dime a week, they feel that having the potential to earn a whole dollar every week is amazing. So far, it’s working. I haven’t had to do very much reminding. I’ll just chirp, “I’m going to make my bed now,” and my kids actually get excited and tackle their own.
Any thoughts? Strangely enough, I hear people talking about housework all the time. I guess that’s because it’s common to all people. Still, I rarely think to pick people’s brains about it. I know at least a couple of really stellar housekeepers read this blog, and a couple of slobs, too. What’s your philosophy towards housework? Are my attempts at encouraging my kids to be a bit more tidy doomed to failure? Is there a better way to go about it that I haven’t considered?
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11 Responses to A very exciting topic — housework!
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- The Inklings
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One book a month for 2012.
Wash ground beef? Like with water???
Yes. Ew, huh? Chicken can handle that kind of treatment, and steaks only suffer a little, but she even does it with ground beef.
I have a Roomba. It’ll manage most of my cleaning since I live alone. Until it decides it wants freedom, that is.
Do you have a fighting harness for your Roomba? It may not be essential for you, if you are pretty clean already, but you also wouldn’t want some rodent sappers rewiring your cleaning bot to act as a spy for the invasion. A little protection goes a long way.
I was considering getting it a cover to make it look all cutesy until I realized that would probably draw the ire of our coming robot overlords.
This is something I think about all the time. I joke that in my house, we live in filth, like frat boys. We don’t really, but sometimes I feel like we do. For me, the ends should justify the means, and they so seldom do. I get so much less reward out of having shiny floors than I do sitting around reading fanfiction for a couple hours, or whatever other task I would have done. About once a week, we cave and give most things at least a once over, then once a month do something more serious, but still pretty half-assed. I should sweep more than I do. I should pick up the kitchen even night, but I don’t. The bathroom gets cleaned thoroughly once a week.
I wouldn’t call my mom a neat freak, but she did run a tight ship. Moreover, she really instilled within me a deep and abiding resentment for housework. Every Saturday, we’d get up and have to clean the whole house. Not sure where my Dad was, maybe cleaning the cars or something, but I never saw him participate. We would go through phases where we had a cleaning lady, but they never lasted very long. So as we were doing all this cleaning, there was a serious atmosphere of anger. Work 40+ hours outside the home, then come home and do most of the work inside it, too. While the set-up I have is a bit more egalitarian, only a little so.
I would like to be a better housekeeper. But I’m so lazy and have all these resentments.
Both my parents are ex-military and I always had to keep my room spit-spot, like hospital corners on the bed, dusted often, no junk on the floor, laundry washed, folded, and put away. I was actually quite well grounded in the cleanliness arts. My car was one of those few places where I didn’t have to keep on top of it constantly, so I didn’t. I’ll admit, though, that when I first met LG I was on a bit of an ogre bender about being messy.
I really just don’t care too much as long as the place is comfortable to live in and junk isn’t in the way (junk = dishes, clothes, papers, etc.). Teresa’s much neater than me, and always has been. I don’t go out of my way to be messy, and I clean up after myself, but I’m not about to let mess be a stress, one way or the other. The only place I like it neat, like, everything generally has a place and I have a clean area, is my workspace, both at work and at home. I don’t need the headache of digging through crap just to find something when I’m “on task”. I think that’s more the exception that proves the rule, though.
Now, when push comes to shove, my military heritage means that when I have to I can knock out cleaning house like gangbusters. I’m really good at it, but it really just doesn’t matter all that much to me.
Wise decision. A cute outfit for a Roomba is asking for it.
That resentment is what I’m trying to tackle, really. I have it, too, big time. I wonder, if these older generations are so much neater because they had so much to do to keep their houses clean, that now it’s so easy to them. I know they certainly tell me I’ve got it simple, but then again, while my Granny was washing hamburger, Chris’ was ironing baby socks! So it seems they also created a bunch of work for themselves that was just unnecessary, and that blows a hole in my whole theory.
My brother and I were talking about this the other day, and what a revelation it is to us that we didn’t have to live in utter madness. He said, “Sissy, did you realize, that when your house is clean, life is so easy? I mean, someone can knock on your door and you don’t step out onto the front porch for fear they see what you live like…”
I just want the kids to realize that before they’re 30. Oh, and Chris — I feel like the whole house is our “workspace” and I don’t need the headache of digging through crap just to find something.
So it seems they also created a bunch of work for themselves that was just unnecessary, and that blows a hole in my whole theory.
Exactly. The Feminine Mystique has a section on housework annecdotes that has always struck with me. Friedan’s thesis for it was that work expands to fill the time alloted. With the advent of post-war time saving devices, there was a gap there– took less time to do what HAD to be done. So little things crept in to make up the difference and pretty soon they had to be done as well. Like one woman changed the linens every day. New sheets, pillowcases on all the beds, every day and I assume everyone used fresh towels and washcloths every day. And then, when it got to be too much to do that on top of the rest of the mounting must-dos, she retreated and decided that that was one thing she could not give up. She could not run a house where people slept on the same sheets more than one night. It was “dirty.”
That, more than anything, helped me come to terms with the resentment. Although it’s creeping back in, very quickly, as our newlywed division of labor breaks down more and more.
So what do you think the “mounting must-dos” are/were, Sarah? It kind of sounds like (and I know this might be beyond the scope of the current conversation) with advancing technology/improving way-of-life we are finding more ‘important’ things to fill our time. Are they really important? Or can we not stand to be idle?
Even when we’re idle, we’re doing something.