The bending lady

At the office, we can have collective cleaning sprees. It undoubtedly has something to do with menstruating at the same time: that seems to happen when you put women together for a longer period. But something is going on with me. My cleaning urge is no longer limited to the office and my home; it is becoming bigger than that.

It started small: when I walked my dog and bent down to pick up a few things she returned to nature (I really try to avoid the word ‘poop’, as you can tell), I immediately picked up whatever I found within a two-meter radius. But now I’m in the cleaning groove and walk down the street like a bending lady. A beer can in the neighbor's hedge (a little souvenir from Bevrijdingspop, thanks visitors for littering the neighborhood), I pick it up. An empty plastic container next to the trash can, oh, I’ll just toss it in. Meanwhile, I also go through life bending down when I’ve been out to dinner with my beloved. He looked very surprised when I suddenly went down on my knees after a pleasant walk from the restaurant to the car. Had the wine gotten to me? No, it was a Bounty wrapper that caught my eye.

I constantly have Boyan Slat on my shoulder telling me how long it takes for such a plastic piece of paper to be processed, so I just can’t leave it behind.

I think there’s only one thing to do to avoid being seen as a weirdo: that you all join me. How beautiful and clean the streets will be if we go through life bending down, and those squats in the gym, we can just skip those right away.

Win-win, in short. If you can still bend down, then bend down with me.