Happy & Healthy

I HAVE A CLEANING MAN

Rolling myself up in the duvet one more time, with my nose in the sun on the balcony with coffee, fighting for all the extras with the newspaper... The weekend is sooo my favorite. And oooh yeahh, it lasts for two whole days. Aaaargh, almost forgot (repressed is what they call it): the household chores.

You only live once, and you’d rather not spend that life vacuuming or on your knees with a scrubber, right? Just to get you right on my next confession : I’m not really a match for cleaning. Understatement: I hate it. Sometimes you’re just not made for each other, the pieces don’t fit. And that’s what’s going on with me and cleaning.

Our house is a reflection of how the week was. Or rather, how my week was. More appointments is my get-out-of-jail-free card to go wild in a huge pile of chaos. And when you go wild, you also keep house, right? Everything I wore (or planned to wear) gets thrown over a railing, no shirt is neatly in the closet, shoes are here but also there throughout the house, and the contents of my bag are happily spread out on the dining table. A house should be lived in, I shout. And that shouting finds zero ears. My love is actually a cleaning man. That’s a thing, because it doesn’t make you a messy person but an extra-degenerate housewife. Not that I have ambition in that area, but you’d think this is in the gene package.

”That laundry can be folded tomorrow and that top hangs just fine on that doorknob”

Is it just me or is cleaning a waste of your time? I can appreciate a tidy house, but actually doing it is another story. I do see those crumbs under my chair, but today is sunny with a chance of terrace, and if I have to choose... He can’t do that. I don’t understand it at all, and he understands me even less. That laundry can be folded tomorrow and that top hangs just fine on that doorknob. And no, I don’t feel a sigh of unrest because I’m not waving my dishcloth.

It took us about six years, but we have a system. He cleans. And thank goodness, because I’m just not good at it. There, that’s out. My house is 24/7 status picobello, but not thanks to me. By the way, I do cook very well.

Written by Adeline Mans