It’s that time again. The chore that for years has filled me with dread and exultation at the same time…Spring Cleaning. I dread doing it because the older I get the longer it takes me, and it just seems to be more and more difficult each year. It’s not the size of the task that’s more daunting, it’s just that I am more prone to procrastination now, and then I feel overwhelmed especially when I seem to be the only contributor to the cause. My sweet husband offers to help, but I’m more fastidious in this season of life. I like to have things done “just so”. So he retreats safely to his shop, his domain, while I putter inside, quietly lamenting my plight, but somehow happier cleaning on my own. My kids and perhaps my grandbabies may call me “fussy”, but honestly I can live with that title.

I suppose I’m not nearly as motivated as I once was when I was a young Mom and I felt it was a duty done for my family’s good more than mine. I mean, for health reasons it’s probably a necessary thing to thoroughly clean the house and once it’s over and done with I am very satisfied with the results. However, the satisfaction is always short-lived. Living in dusty, windy Alberta, house cleaning is a never ending exercise in futility. Truly someone needs to invent a once and done gadget that will rid my house of these pesky dust bunnies that have become Easter décor in my home this year.

I don’t mean to be a complainer, I know the Scriptures say to be “joyful in all things”, but I never thought that when I said, “I do” forty-seven years ago, that I’d be doing some of the things I’m doing now in perpetuity. I’m a relatively intelligent woman, or so that Masters Degree on the wall indicates, but I have a hard time finding much mental stimulation scrubbing toilet bowls and shooing dust bunnies from under the bed.

I remember lamenting about Spring Cleaning when I was a young Mom. I was blessed with three very creative children and during their preschool years I was a stay-at-home Mom. I loved it. I loved interacting with them all day long, but it was the cleaning up after them that was challenging. I would just start the tidying on one side of the house only to discover they’d dismantled my efforts on the other side. I’ve learned now when the Grands come to visit to confine them better in a designated play area. That way the creative mess stays more or less in one general area, and my adult children have taught their children to clean up after themselves before they go home to make it easier on Grandma. It befuddles me how they are so considerate of me now than when they were children. I guess age matters.

Then there is the man I married. Bless him. He’s had a system for sorting his socks since we were newlyweds. He’s got one pair of socks that he wears to church/work, one pair he wears to the gym, and one pair he wears in the yard or shop. For years they were sorted beside the bed on the floor. I couldn’t move them or else his whole system would have become sock chaos and I would be left with this disgruntled sockless man who would accuse me of sock sabotage! In our empty nesting years, we have compromised. Now the socks are draped over a chair along with the three outfits he rotates through during the week. At the end of the week, I throw the whole lot into the laundry and the cycle begins again. At least they’re not on the floor!

I had to laugh when the Christmas wish lists were posted for all my family members and my daughters and daughter-in-love, declared that the kids did not need more toys, they needed socks! As my son said, his boys wear the same pair of socks until they literally fall off their feet in disgust. I did notice the other day that all four of the boys had mismatched socks. Rather than be concerned, it has become a fashion statement.

But I digress…

I see the annual Spring Cleaning ritual as just an extension of normal, every day housecleaning but with more frenzy. The name kind of makes me think that just because it has such a bright and cheery name, I will take to it more agreeably. It’s like the old adage, ‘a spoon full of sugar helps the medicine go down’. It’s still medicine, it still tastes bad. Spring Cleaning is just cleaning, plain and simple, only more of it, to be done in less time, and with a lot less help.

I don’t know what it is, but just thinking about Spring Cleaning, has elicited an inordinate amount of random videos to pop up on my iPhone of people cleaning their homes. I don’t know what’s worse, the fact my phone reads my thoughts, or the fact these people really seem to enjoy cleaning their homes! I like the result, not the process. So, I decided this year to get a jump-start on my Spring Cleaning, doing one task at a time,… rest, recover, and then repeat over several weeks. I tackled my refrigerator a few weeks ago. Let’s just say it was a long, arduous undertaking, with lots of unlabeled Tupperware, wilted produce, and several overdue expiry dates. I can only liken the task to an archeological dig in there. It wasn’t pleasant.

Still, I try to accomplish something each day. I’ve washed windows, gotten most of the grandbaby handprints off of walls and mirrors. I have organized my kitchen, my storage room, cleaned, sorted, dusted, vacuumed and mopped. I decided to clean out all our closets, and cupboards. I was thorough and brutal with purging things that no longer brought me “joy”. Taking a car load of stuff to donate to charity brought me great joy!

Of course now I can’t find anything. *sigh*