Nobody likes squalor, but too often we just get used to it as it builds up until it finally reaches the point where it’s overwhelming and too daunting a task to deal with. Both sexes are capable of this and it’s a sure sign of an unhealthy lifestyle. Cleaning that shit up makes the world seem at least a little bit better.
All of this week’s tips and suggestions for how to clean your home are useless if you’re one of those so-called ‘men’ with a thick streak of perpetual adolescence and you don’t clean in the first place. For you there is still hope; perhaps it will be that you someday wish to have a girl at your place and you’ll need to pick up your shit to get her to stay, or at least feel comfortable when she does.
On the other hand, you could be one of those old world misogynistic cockhammers who feels that cleaning the house is woman’s work.
I won’t fool myself into thinking that my pithy article will change your mind. If your father and mother so thusly screwed up your world view, you need some serious therapy to work through that one, but the odds are that you’re of the mind that there’s nothing wrong with you anyway. If that’s the way you want to go through life, so be it. Just please don’t married and pretty please with bourbon on top, do not pass that shit on to another generation.
I know a few couples for whom this attitude is their way of life, and in each case both partners are unhappy. The woman has allowed herself to be repressed and controlled, the man dominates and loses more and more respect for his wife as a result. It’s an outdated model, sustained by the small-minded and the insecure. It’s a heartbreaking recipe for disaster and misery.
However, if you’ve gone into your marriage/relationship fully cognizant of equal worth and responsibilities, with mutual respect and understanding, and you both consciously choose for the woman in the relationship to be Suzy Homemaker and the man to be the breadwinner, that’s a different story. Hell, it’s even kind of nostalgic-romantic, I suppose. If this is what she wants, and you want a woman to be little more than a domestic goddess, well, power to you. When she gets bored of that (an inevitability, I suspect, in this day and age), I hope like hell that you can roll with it. But you should still pitch in and help her out when and where you can; think of it as a romantic courtesy if nothing else.
Hell, I live with the model Susie Homemaker, and I still try to pitch in here and there. I keep my office area clean at a minimum, handle the trash and recycle duties, and can even be occasionally arsed to pick up the rest of the house.
I am the primary cleaner/cook in my household and I don’t have any problem with it. My girlfriend, however, isn’t the tidy sort and readily admits it. How do I get her to help clean up around the house?
I don’t mind cleaning, but my problem is once I get going, I can’t stop. I go into hyperdrive. Then when I’m done, I’m wore out and sick of cleaning (altho, it does look damn nice).
Moving into a brand new, neverlived in duplex next week. That will be a nice starting point.
My office at work is a train wreck, almost literally. I need to get a picture of that for the contest.
A co-worker of mine once detailed his process of getting his wife to pick up after herself. He asked her nicely to pick up her clothes and put them in a hamper rather than simply letting them accumulate on the floor. When she failed to acquiesce to his request he nailed her clothes to the floor. Yes, that’s what he did.
My co-worker did not expound on whether this technique in-fact caused his wife to rethink her slovenly ways and repent, but the fact that his wife is not his ex-wife I can only surmise that there were deeper issues at hand than the laundry.
I do not recommend this course of action to Zack, nor have I felt willing to shake hands with death in this manner myself, but it strikes me that often cleaning can be a very touchy subject as it will expose you for the sloth or OCD maniac that you are.
Rye,
Yeah, nailing the dirty clothes seems a bit harsh.
The real problem is I’m not all that clean. I leave dishes in the sink for a couple of days, I let crap accumulate on the counter and I will leave dirty clothes next to the bed. About once a week I go around a pick up the dirty laundry and piles of crap and have been accumulating and toss the detritus and find a home for the other stuff. I also have been working on keeping up with the dishes better and am very interested in the comment on that post.
I believe part of the problem is she spends three nights a week at my place and the rest at home (she moved home to lives with her parents to save money). So she’s living a rather transient lifestyle. But within the next few months we’ll probably be moving in together. I’m hoping she can adopt my somewhat cleaner lifestyle when we get a place and am hoping it doesn’t drive me nuts.
You would *totally* be my best friend if you came over and cleaned my place.
No man should be without a housekeeper, they are worth every penny.
The problem with housekeeping is that it usually comes to a head at the most inconvenient times - like you have a girl or friends coming over on a Friday night and you are already trying to assemble dinner and get yourself looking ok, and you realize your house is a mess.
In such cases it is just a huge relief knowing the housekeepers are coming - I have them come on Friday afternoons for this reason.