Junk

I have always been a bit of a neat freak and my two older daughters have inherited the same tendencies as me. I remember sharing a bedroom with my sister growing up. There was an imaginary line drawn in the room that signified her side of the room and my side. Her side of the room always looked like a bomb hit, my side was as neat as a pin. There was a place for everything and everything had a place.

Now as an adult I am still neat, my room is cleaned once a week and my bed sheets are changed. God forbid that I, sleep on bed sheets that have been on the bed for two weeks, to me it’s just so yucks!! My floors in the house are swept and mopped every day, yes in my house there are chores that must be done every day. MUST! Going to work my house was left in an orderly fashion once I got home from work it was in disarray because of my kids and this would put me in a bad mood for the rest of the evening and have me reaching for the bottle of vodka. I live by schedules and I need order around me so if my schedule is screwed up somehow and there is disorder all around I cannot function. So now with Chinese New Year coming up once again it’s time for spring cleaning.

When I was working I used to use my leaves just to stay home and clean house, not take holidays. With only one day off a week there wasn’t much time for spring cleaning. Now I’m not working I have more time unfortunately I don’t have the energy I used to have, while the spirit is willing the body is protesting. I actually hate spring cleaning and yet I relish in the fact that my house will be clean. With spirits high I painted my bedroom two days after Christmas, nothing like an early start. Painting my room used to take me one day to paint, this year or should I say last year it took me two days. On the end of the first day of painting my body ached so badly I was practically crawling around on all fours. That night I forced my kids to make up my bed and position it in the middle of the room so I could sleep in my half painted room. I managed to finish painting the next day which was New Years Eve. That was Thursday and New Years Day I rested. The day after though I cleaned out the store room or rather forced my kids to clean it out and I of course ended up finishing it.

This past weekend I cleaned out my kitchen cupboards. I thought they had not been cleaned out for ten years but my eldest daughter assures me that she has cleaned them out a few times when she was at home. Phew thank god I would hate to think they had never been cleaned, they certainly looked like it though. One thing about cupboards, they are a neat freaks dream. Any junk can be thrown inside and not seen unless you open the cupboard. This past Christmas though I noticed how dirty they were and there wasn’t any space left. Things were piling up on the kitchen table and that’s another thing that irritates me, junk on the kitchen table and so it was time to clean out those cupboards.

I was merciless in my cleaning; things that are not used and will not be used in the future were thrown out. By time I finished I had two bags of junk and as I put everything back in the cupboard that I was keeping I wondered how all that shit could fit inside in the first place. I got most of it done but I still have two cupboards to clean, this weekend. I also noticed that my legs were aching on Monday.
So this weekend I intend to finish the kitchen cupboards, there really isn’t that much more time before Chinese New year. Once the kitchen is clean the next project is my bedroom cupboard. My cupboards are full of clothes that I cannot wear since I gained weight. Curse you menopause! I’m sure there will be two more big bags to throw out. I had intended to do some painting in the house but after the experience of painting my room nah I’ll wait until next year when I can hire someone to paint the house for me. As I said the spirit is willing but the body is protesting.